Rocks flew out from under the tires of Phoebe's Jeep. The trail up to the lake was always a mess full of encroaching flora and loose gravel. Someone had once made an attempt to make the trail an actual road but had never maintained it. Ahead, she could see a sign post leaning at a dangerous angle. The remaining destination sign pointed to the Camp Radiance which was in the opposite direction of her destination.

Phoebe made a left, sparing a glance for the flashes of the lake she could see through the trees. A month of corralling children around the water while their shrill shouts scraped through her ears.

"Remember, you signed up for this, dummy," she chastised herself. It was the fourth year she'd signed up to be a counselor at Camp Spruce Grove. If she hadn't skipped the year before it would have been her fifth year in a row. There she did her best to teach kids the basics of camping and how to behave like cooperative small humans. Most of the kids were easy and thrilled to be away from home and school for a month. Even the kids who eventually missed home still knew to behave.

A few of the other counselors liked to tell horror stories about the past camps they'd been at. One in particular did a summer at a camp for troubled teens and liked to terrify them with the antics they'd pulled on him. It wasn't a job for a pushover, that was for sure. The worst Phoebe had ever seen at Spruce Grove was a kid's clothes on the roof of a cabin.

It took another half hour to reach the semicircle of log cabins arranged around a large fire pit. A few of the other counselor's cars were already parked in the makeshift parking lot marked off by two wooden posts and a bit of rope. There was no sign of the bus yet. With luck she'd get another hour without the gremlins trying to pull her attention in eight different directions.

Eli and Linda shouted greetings but didn't stop in their efforts to bring all of the luggage inside the center cabin. The biggest cabin was flanked by five smaller cabins, three to the right and two to the left. The teen campers slept in the two cabins on the left, leaving the younger kids to the right. Having the extra distance between the older and younger kids helped when different curfews went into effect for special events.

The little kids got crankiest when they knew the older kids were off on an adventure.

Just thinking of going on one of those overnight campouts gave Phoebe full body chills. She parked her car and leaned her forehead against the steering wheel. Last summer she'd spent her time on a sandy beach with the sun burning her to a crisp while Mike kept her supplied with snacks.

Despite how that summer ended, it was still preferable to the last trip to the woods. Screams echoed in her ears, sounds of crunching metal and shattering glass sent her shoulders flying up to her ears. She screamed when Claire tapped on her window.

"Woah there, take it easy," Claire said around her giggles. "It's just me." The brunette was two years younger than Phoebe and only two years into being a counselor. It was their first summer working together. The last time they'd seen each other, Claire had still been a camper.

Phoebe shoved the door open and swung her legs out. "Yeah, I can see that," she muttered. "Who else is here?" Who else could Phoebe rope into this conversation so that she wasn't trapped having a one on one with the girl?

"Well Eli and Linda have been unpacking because Linda way overpacked again. Director Sutton said he got here yesterday morning along with Omar, they carpooled. I'd bet anything Aaron won't show up until the kids have unpacked." Claire ran through her information like an automated voice message system with no pause button.

The girl kept talking even as Phoebe gathered her things to bring inside. Unzipping her suitcase and yawning was meant to be a subtle hint for peace and quiet but it flew so far over Claire's head it could have been in space. Phoebe finally paused with her open suitcase in front of her surrounded by her unpacked clothes on the bed. "Hey, Claire?"

"Huh?" She stopped mid rant about the choice of noodles and which campers would hate them most.

"Shouldn't you be setting up your cabin?" Phoebe asked. A desperate prayer went up from the back of her mind. If anyone was listening they would have her on an opposite shift from Claire. There was a limited amount of time she'd be able to handle being in the same room, even the same building. Camping with the kids would be fine since they'd provide a hearty distraction.

It was all moot if Claire ended up being her cabin partner. They'd have to coordinate everything. The divine space aliens wouldn't be that cruel, would they?

"No, Linda's handling that. She's so specific about how she wants it done I thought I should just leave her to it," Claire said.

"Right." Phoebe turned away to hide a scowl. Not everyone picked up on subtle hints and she expected Claire wouldn't react well to a direct approach either. Already she was off on a new tangent with no end in sight. She glanced at her phone and saw the single bar flickering in and out of existence.

It disappeared completely and Phoebe counted the seconds until it came back.

A minute passed and her heart thudded loudly in her chest. There was cell service here. Every summer she'd gone both as a camper and counselor; there had been an adult with a phone to call the outside world. There was signal at the lake. There always was

No signal.

Phoebe balled her hands into fists to hide the shaking. The bar reappeared and a second one followed it. She exhaled sharply and black spot faded from the corners of her eyes.

"Are you all traumatized from whatever it was that happened in the woods? I thought you had to be over that to come here as a counselor," Claire huffed.

"Excuse me?" Phoebe lowered her hands from where she'd started to massage her temples.

"You know, that weird shit that happened... two years ago? Up in Pennsylvania?" she clarified. "They said that's why you weren't here last year but I thought you would have gotten over it. Who goes to the woods again after that if they aren't okay?"

The silence that fell over the room was as thick and suffocating as one of the spare blankets reserved for extra cold nights. Some of the counselors swore the blankets dated back from prehistoric times. They were made of some sort of wool taken from the angriest sheep, judging by how scratchy they were. Phoebe had been on the receiving end of one when she was ten and a thunderstorm knocked out all the heaters. Fighting to breathe while she hid under one was what had finally cured her fear of thunderstorms.

Phoebe pushed her shoulders down and away from her ears. "Don't talk about that, ever. That shit," Phoebe spat the word out while she hooked her fingers into air quotes, "isn't something you get over. Just so our stories are straight, I'm here because I want to go back to normal. If you'd like to pay for my next round of therapy then go ahead and drag me on down memory lane."

"Well excuse me for being concerned about one of my friends," Claire sputtered.

"We are not friends," Phoebe said sharply.

That finally gave Claire the push to storm out of the room and Phoebe shut locked the door behind her. The lock clicked and the air became thin, leaving Phoebe fighting for a proper breath.

The screams surrounded her on all sides. Beyond the screams were the shrieks. Black dots in her vision coalesced into humanoid shapes with twisting horns above their heads. Phoebe felt the breath against her neck and muffled a scream with both palms pressed painfully tight against her mouth.

"When you feel overwhelmed, splash cold water over your face and count to ten."

Doctor Vorsen's calm voice washed over her and set her limbs into motion beyond her control. The bathroom was down the hall, too far to help, but the bottle of water she dumped over her head worked well enough. She stood there in the middle of her room while droplets fell from her nose and chin onto the wood floor.

Outside she heard the bus pull into the parking lot and shrieking children filled the area.

Chapter WC: 1438
Total WC: 1438