It wasn’t until my sister and I were fourteen that Mom and Dad let us go camping together without them escorting us. They made us promise we wouldn’t go farther than fifteen minutes into the woods that sat across from our house. We were told to pack bug spray and pepper spray, sporks and pocket knives, warm clothes and whistles. I knew Dad would be sitting on the porch in his rocker all night, black coffee in hand, ready to charge into the forest after us at the drop of a dime, at the blow of a whistle.
It made me feel safe knowing he was so close, just in case. That’s why, every time we heard the echo of coyote howls, I wasn’t scared.
Scarlett and I made a fire a few feet from our tent, wrapping ourselves in the wool blanket we’d packed. Flames danced on the darkness of the trees surrounding us, and I sang to give them rhythm. To match that rhythm, my sister braided my hair, her fingers soothing against my scalp as they repeated their over-under-over movements. Then, with our hair out of our faces, we stuffed ourselves full of s’mores, mirrors for each other when it came to wiping our faces free of sticky marshmallow and melted chocolate. We sipped campfire cocoa and whispered ghost stories through the beam of our flashlights until our words started to slur and we began drifting off.
“Ember,” my sister hush-yelled into my ear, shaking me awake.
“What?” I groaned, blinking myself back from my dream.
“I need to pee.”
Buddy system. One of Dad’s rules. I groggily grabbed my flashlight from the ground next to me and stood, pulling my sweater back up onto my shoulders. As we ventured out into the night, we held hands, fingers white and trembling, imaginations quickening our feet as branches snapped and the wind whistled through trees no longer lit by dancing flames. Everywhere the beam of our flashlight wasn’t, bears and wolves and cougars waited, eyes reflective in the blackwood sea, bodies nonexistent. My skin crawled as I waited, alone. When more than a minute passed and my sister hadn’t walked back out onto the path, my worry grew. I called her name, but there was no answer.
Terrified, I stepped into the night void, and the path disappeared from view within seconds. The flashlight hardly provided any comfort, my skin crawling as I moved the beam of light from one tree to the next. I called for Scarlett over and over, and when my light started flickering, I smacked my hand against the warm plastic. It was no use. The pitch-blackness engulfed me, and I sank to the ground, screaming to drown out the silence. I grabbed at the whistle hanging around my neck and raised it to my lips—
“Ember!”
I shrieked and dropped the whistle as my sister grabbed my shoulder, her flashlight breaking up the night.
“Where in the hell did you go?” I yelled. “Why weren’t you answering me?”
“I’m sorry,” she cried. “I must have turned the wrong way. I didn’t realize how far I’d gone off the path, and—”
“Forget it,” I said, grabbing her hand. “Let’s get out of here!”
We raced back to the path, then back to our site, feet crushing grass, cool night air burning our lungs. The tent was home base, and its walls might as well have been stone instead of coated polyester. We zipped ourselves in and hugged each other under the wool blanket. After we stopped shivering, I broke the silence.
“We never tell Mom and Dad about this, okay? I should have gone with you. We won’t make that mistake again, and they never have to know we made it in the first place. You understand?”
Scarlett nodded.
“Good. Now, I have an idea.”
I had my sister hold her flashlight so it was pointing at the tent wall, and I used my hands to make animals out of the shadows. We laughed until our cheeks hurt, eventually dozing off with smiles on our faces.
The next morning, I woke up with the sun. I started another fire and made some more cocoa. Then, I pulled two bananas out of the pack we’d hung from a tree the night before. Scarlett joined me within twenty minutes. We sipped out of our mugs and enjoyed the warm light shining through the trees. After a while, we began packing up, singing some of our favorite songs while we took down the tent and loaded our bags. We made the walk back last as long as we could, taking little detours over fallen trees and scrambling over bunches of boulders. When we finally made it out of the woods, the sun was high in the sky.
“We did it,” I said, holding my hand up for a high five.
“Hell yeah we did,” Scarlett laughed, not leaving me hanging.
“You think Dad sat outside all night?” I asked.
“Absolutely.”
I agreed with her. I expected him, when we got back, to be dead asleep in his chair, coffee mug dangling from his fingers. I smiled at the thought of waking him up, of showing him we did it, of hugging him while he told us he was just glad we were home.
That smile disappeared when I saw him standing at the foot of the porch stairs with his gun, Mom close behind.
“Where in the hell are they?” Mom asked, her hands clenching Dad’s shirt.
“We’re right here, Mom,” I said as I walked up to her.
“What’s going on?” Scarlett asked.
“I knew I shouldn’t have let them go without me. Stay here in case they come back. Blow your whistle three times. I’m gonna go look for them.”
“Dad, what are you talking about?” my sister asked. “We are right here!”
But he didn’t answer.
“Dad?” I reached out and touched his arm. He shivered, goosebumps forming on his bare skin.
“Honey?” Mom whispered, reaching out for Dad.
“I just got chills. Something is wrong. Very, very wrong.”
Mom covered her mouth, her eyes beginning to water.
“Ember, what’s happening?” my sister yelled. “Mom! Dad! We’re right here! Look! We’re right in front of you!”
But they couldn’t see us. They were the ones with the flashlights, and we were the animals in the night void, bodies nonexistent.