Their eyes stood out like swinging lanterns in the darkness. Except I knew for a fact this wasn't a search party, nor a lost hiker; no, this was the Shadow Pack.

Next I smelled the stench of blood, acrid against my nostrils. I half wanted to throw up at at such a smell, but I stomached my nausea and focused on scaling the spruce tree that could potentially save my life.

A snarl, echoing over the mountains. My heart jump-started its beats. I will never get used to that horrible jump-scare. I curled my fingers around the tree bark, blood cracking open from the abrasions. I swallowed the stinging pain. My life was more important.

Their snarls continued, my heart jumping along with it. I could make the climb! There wasn't much distance left from the canopy of leaves. I sighed with relief. If it had been winter, I don't know what I would've done. My skeleton would be half covered with snow by now.

There wasn't much left I could hope for. My bloody fingers worked for the next notch in the bark, and the snarls kept getting louder and louder. Their ominous howls cracked my eardrums. This wasn't what I exactly pictured my summer camping trip. Wolves weren't a rarity here, but risking your chances alone would be a suicide mission.

Something like me to challenge that belief.

If Millie was here, she would be barking at me that I shouldn't have camped in the first place. Then she'd threaten to take off her wedding ring and toss it beside the stove, usually unlit. My only response to that would be a disinterested shrug while I scooped out the sludge from our Keurig. She had a bad habit of leaving the coffeemaker dirty, and every time it would piss me off.