“Wait wait wait!”

Caleb moaned. They had been sitting there, pouring over the four videos on Paul’s phone, seemingly forever. Liam was, admittedly, driving him a little crazy. 

“What?” Caleb said in exasperation, “are you going to point out another tree branch?”

“No, for real,” Liam said, “gimme the phone back.”

Rolling his eyes, Caleb handed back the phone. Then, he watched curiously as Liam did something. Caleb tried to see what Liam was doing, but instead Liam leaned back into the couch, obscuring his view. After a second, Liam’s eyes grew huge. 

“What?” Caleb asked excitedly. When Liam did nothing more than bring a hand to his mouth, Caleb became even more excited. “What?”

Now looking horrified, Liam turned the phone. Caleb gasped at the image, the smile disappearing immediately. He recoiled, understanding why Liam had looked the way he had.

“What the fuck is that?”

“I–I d’no.”

The image was of some sort of humanoid figure. They were a blur, white and grey. Their features, however, were wrong. The eyes were completely obscure, two black holes staring vacantly at the camera. The mouth, equally black, was opened wide, twisted into an abnormally large gape. Whatever it was looked to be in pain, or perhaps even fear; deep shadows played on the wrinkles of its brow, the curves of its mouth, making it look like something out of a horror movie.

“I saw it in the background,” Liam whispered. “It’s there for a split second, before Paul screams and starts to run away. It’s right by the railroad tracks.”

“It has to be light,” Caleb reasoned, even though his voice didn’t even believe itself. “Like, maybe–maybe the headlights from our car, or–or Paul kept saying he thought he saw something–”

“Caleb–”

“Yeah, he thought he saw an animal, so–so maybe–maybe it’s like, a dog or something–”

“That’s not a fucking dog, Caleb!”

Caleb slammed his mouth shut.

“That–that looks like a person!” Liam said in disbelief.

“I’ve never seen a person like that,” Caleb replied, his voice shaking a little bit. “What the fuck is going on?” Caleb said angrily then. He got to his feet and began to pace.

After a few moments, Liam got to his feet as well. “What did you do?”

Caleb spun around. “What did I do?”

“What if you summoning me didn’t only bring me back?” Liam downright squeaked, unable to mask his fear and panic. “What if that’s a demon, or–or–”

Caleb grabbed the backpack off the table, shoving its contents back into it. Wordlessly he strode to the door.

“Hey!” Liam snapped. “Where are you going?”

“Stay here.” Caleb glanced at Liam over his shoulder. “I’m going to go pay Paul a visit.” 

Without allowing Liam to reply, he left.

~

“Oh hey Cale–oof!”

Caleb roughly shoved Paul’s backpack against his chest. Stumbling backward from the unexpected impact, Paul  looked immediately guilty and panicked. “My–my backpack?”

“Let me in, Paul. We have some things to discuss.”

Paul's mouth opened and closed a few times. 

"Now," Caleb growled. 

Still clutching the backpack, Paul backed up a few more feet. Caleb entered the apartment and shut the door behind him. When he looked back to Paul, Paul looked scared. Looking serious, Caleb spoke in a calm, low voice. 

"Why did you call the cops on me?" 

"I was worried about you," Paul replied without hesitation. 

“So, it had nothing to do with the black cars?”

“What black cars?” Paul asked exasperatedly. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about. You’ve been under so much stress, I just–”

“What? You just what?”

Paul dropped his eyes momentarily before flicking them back up. “I admit it, I called them to do a wellness check on you.”

Caleb crossed his arms, though deep down he was appreciative.

“Your mom says you haven’t answered her calls in days.” 

This surprised him, and he uncrossed his arms. “My mom?”

Paul nodded. Scoffing, Caleb folded his arms across his chest once more. He jutted his chin towards the backpack Paul was clutching. 

“What were you doing in the forest, Paul?”

Paul swallowed audibly. “When you wanted me to come over the other day, and you weren’t making sense, and you had that book, and the sprinklers went off–”

“Yeah? What about it?”

Paul’s shoulders slouched. “What were you doing? Were you–I d’no, doing a seance or something?”

Caleb laughed, suddenly feeling proud. A seance seemed so trivial to him, almost childish. A silly trick compared to what he had actually accomplished.

“Were you trying to talk to Liam, Caleb?” Paul pressed. “Is that what you were trying to show me?”

Caleb frowned. 

“It’s why I called the police to check up on you. You just seemed….frazzled.” 

Caleb still remained silent.

“Look,” Paul said, still looking uneasy. “You’re a logical person–or at least you were. I went back where Liam was because I thought–”

Paul’s face momentarily flashed in pain and he stopped talking. Caleb narrowed his eyes slightly.

“You what, Paul?”

“I d’no,” Paul mumbled, now looking embarrassed. “You just–you seemed so sure, yaknow? You had me convinced that maybe something was overlooked. Sometimes the simplest answers are right in front of our noses.”

Caleb wanted to play it innocently. “Did anything become of it?”

Paul looked defeated. “No. Besides some shadows, I didn’t find anything.”

“Are you sure?” Caleb asked, sounding hopeful.

Paul looked sad once more, but this time the look wasn’t fleeting. “I’m sure. I’m sorry, Caleb. I would’ve loved to find something, too.”

Caleb, from years of working at a bar, had gotten a pretty good handle on how to read people. With the added benefit of knowing Paul for years, and being a friend, it was easy. The man was sincere. As such, Caleb walked forward and unzipped the backpack, pulling out the phone. As he spoke to Paul, he deleted the creepy image of the face. 

“I found your phone. Sorry, I shouldn’t have poked around, but I noticed, er, I noticed you recorded some stuff.”

Paul laughed, taking the phone back and giving it a quick glance. “Great, so you saw me make an ass out of myself, huh?”

Caleb merely smiled.

Paul shook his head. “Look, I know it probably seems crazy. I had the knife for protection, and the map in case I got lost; I’d be able to follow the river. I don’t know if you noticed, but cell signal is pretty wonky over in that area. If I got lost, GPS wouldn’t have helped me. I was recording because I thought–you know, in case I found something. I wanted there to be evidence, yaknow? I wanted to check because you seem so sure, Caleb. I wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt.”

Touched, Caleb swallowed the lump in his throat away and gave a curt nod.

Now Paul laughed. “Plus after seeing that seance stuff you were doing or whatever, I was, well, I was a little creeped out too. I guess I just needed to prove to myself–”

Paul stopped.

“What?” Caleb prodded.

Paul looked uncomfortable and gave a one shouldered shrug. “I needed to prove that seances aren’t real and the sprinklers turning on was just a coincidence. I needed to prove to myself that you’re just stressed–no offense.” Paul looked away and spoke quietly. “I just needed to prove to myself Liam’s actually dead, with no good explanation. Because if I didn’t find anything, then it proves it, right?”

“Paul. I’m sorry.”

Paul looked confused. “Caleb–you have nothing to be sorry for.”

Caleb shook his head. “I didn’t mean to put additional stress on you. I’ll take better care of myself from here on out, alright? I’ll get some sleep, I’ll stop messing around with that book–stop trying to do seances. I’ll eat better and stuff, okay?”

Paul looked relieved. “Do you mean it?”

“I do.”

Paul gripped the backpack at his chest. There was an awkward silence.

Caleb looked at his feet finally. "I wanted to say that I appreciate you being such a good friend, Paul. I mean, I met you through Liam, but you're still here for me—" 

He didn't get the chance to finish his sentence, because Paul set down his backpack and pulled him into a tight hug. 

"Liam was my best friend, Caleb. Of course I'm going to be here for you. If anything else, he would have wanted me to look out for you." 

Caleb nodded nimbly against the other man's shoulder, appreciating the hug. 

"You're my friend, too, Caleb, and I need you to know that. You're not just a tag along from Liam, alright? I mean it."

Caleb nodded and headed to the door. He mumbled a thank-you and a final apology to Paul for being a bother, and then left. He felt bad for leaving so abruptly, but he was embarrassed, not wanting Paul to see him crying.