The footsteps were getting louder, the lights flickering because of the thunderstorm. We were all hiding separately, waiting quietly while trying to hold our shaky breath, tears building up in our eyes. But being out in the woods it was hard to find a way out, we were lost all we heard was the raindrops, the thunder which made it much harder to find each other or even find shelter. I finally found shelter and ended up crashing into someone quickly screaming and hitting them, I didn't know who it was or what it was. Quickly I got a branch and hit it as hard as a can, until it started grunting I ran and got tacked to the floor.

"C-can you just shut up and calm down, i-it is just me." I slowly opened my eyes, I would have said something but he was covering my mouth with his hand. He didn't take his hand off until making sure I was going to stay quiet, he slowly removed his hand when we heard a cracking sound and a female scream coming from right in front us. It was still dark and rainy, and because we were in the woods it was starting to get foggy and we couldn't tell how close we were from the scream. The scream was loud and high pitched, until it got quiet and...

"AAHhhh! aahhahh!!" me and Veronica yelled, while our four idiots of friends were laughing behind the couch with masks on and a flash going off. "You ahhah guys should have s-s-seen your faces-s." Gene could barely spit out his sentence. The guys sat next us laughing hysterically, the floor and seat covered in popcorn and candy. We put the documentary on pause and stand up leaving the guys the couch for themselves. "Are you guys not gonna continue the movie or what." "Or are you toooo scared." Zenix and Lawrence say to us high fiving at the end. I honestly prefer it when Zenix hated him, they are a pain now that they get along, always teasing me all.

"No you guys ruined the documentary for us." I growled rolling eyes, and picking my pillow up making sure of hitting them, when leaving. When we got closer to my room, hearing the guys laughing and shouting. We turned off the lights and we went to sleep, or at least tried to get some sleep. The next morning I woke up to my house being a mess, I walked into the living room, food, drinks, clothes and utensils all scattered on the floor. Memories from last night came flooding in along with a headache.

It was Sunday and classes were cancelled for Monday for some town holiday. I turned on the coffee machine and took out cups and plates for everyone. Groggily Lawrence walks up to me hugging me from back whispering or murmuring I really couldn't even understand what he was saying. I turned around smiling at him, the tip of our noses were touching until I pushed him away because he stink of alcohol. "Ok go take a shower and if the other ones wake up tell them to shower, they also stink." I mentioned, finishing making breakfast for everyone. About thirty minutes later almost everybody had come to the table to eat breakfast and finished showering. "So do any of you remember what happened last night," Ashton blurts with confusion in his face. Veronica twirling her fork around says, "all I remember is the birthday party, the sheriff fiasco thingy, and movies with some alcohol, that is giving me a major headache."

In sync we all said ohh nodding our heads and finished our breakfasts, going to sleep again.

The thanksgiving break was already coming up next week. The leaves were falling, making the ground outside different shades of green and brown. Fall was my favorite season, mostly because of thanksgiving but I mostly liked it because of all the events that happen in town and the days off school. In fall I met my three best friends, it was when the town was open, and for us adventure and mystery lovers it is when the town's death and disappearance started occurring. After finding the torn diary, I started creating theories about where and who it belonged to.... And I came out with nothing, sighing in frustration, Veronica walked in with two cups of hot chocolate and marshmallows, he had barely done them you could see the steam.

"I had forgotten you still had that." "Yeah well I was thinking, what if it's connected to the deaths and disappearances from the town. I mean the dates do correlate," I suggested, giving her a side glance. She walked to my empty was with her cup in one hand and thumb tacks and combination of pictures and missing person flyers. "So say the diary and the disappearances are correlated then would mean, the last entry belongs to the body they found a couple of weeks back." I started to look closely at the pictures, I got some sticky notes and wrote down dates according to the entries and tried to connect them according to the date they went missing and found. Gene and Lawrence walked into my room, or at least what is a room, the room was covered in papers, books, food, drinks and clothes were everywhere. I promise I am a clean person, just not today.

"Did we walk in on an episode of unsolved mysteries." "Or a dumpster," Gene murmured as he was wearing heels for the first time. We glared at both of them, and then the smell of fresh pantries distracted me. "Please tell me you brought some croissants!" "How did you know?" Lawrence replied, with a questioning tone. With my eyes sparkling I took the bag of pastries out of his hand and replied 'I could smell it.' After enjoying our pastries and hot chocolate, we explained to them about our little tradition of exploring and adventure during the fall, then explained the wall with dates and pictures.

"This may sound weird, but the day I bumped into you," I pointed to Lawrence. "Your books fell and you left this one behind. I was going to return it back to you, but I forgot, but now that we are here, do you remember why you checked this book out?" He grabbed the book out of my hand, and started flipping through the pages trying to remember, but his facial expression revealed he didn't know. "I don't remember but I might have checked it out to fix the book, it looks like it can tear apart any minute." My door opened, Ashton and Zenix walked in, eyeing my room before walking in. "you seriously like a dude that fixes books!?!" Ashton smacked Zenix in the head and apologized for his comment.

Things weren't yet back to normal with me and Zenix, but we were making progress. We could at least now start a conversation but it would get awkward in a couple of minutes, and with the situation with his dad just made it much harder for us to talk. In the end the whole day was spent in researching any abandoned or 'haunted' places like Gene and Ashton suggested and looking at the towns disappearances and deaths correlated with the diary. With blasted twenty one pilots on the speaker and created theories and planned out our trips for thanksgiving week. Once afternoon hit we all took a break, we were starting to feel sleepy but the scent of coffee beans filled the room, Zenix had brought us all coffee to give us energy. "Any places we are planning to visit or new theories." "me and Gene think there might be an abandoned hospital a couple of miles away from the town," Gene pinned the map to the wall circling the location, and Ashton showed us some articles about the place.

It had apparently burned down and were planning on rebuilding it but there was never approval for the reconstruction because of the terrain. They printed out all of the articles and papers related to the story and put it all in a binder. We started reading the articles and getting supplies for the trip. "Hey listen to this, during opening day the screams of patients and staff are heard and echoes of footsteps are heard all night. People that have entered have come out with hallucinations later on killing themselves or somebody else." "What article is that Fay?" I handed Lawrence the article, while the rest just looked at each other, with a creepy smile, that basically told me they have an idea.

"Ok this is what we are going to do, opening day is in about three days. I say we go that day during the night and see for ourselves if it is true." Zeni and Gene immediately agreed while us three were skeptical about the idea. "I don't think it matters when we go there is just one article that talks about the people hearing screaming," Ashton replies, rolling his eyes. They started arguing about and I just sighed, Gene looked confused yet entertain, which out of curiosity I asked, "Gene you have no clue what opening day is huh?" Ashton and Veronica stopped arguing and explained that it was the day the town was open about two hundred years or so. After several long hours they all left my house finally we ended up deciding to go during opening day and enjoy the festival while that day came by.

Ashton and Zenix agreed to talk to Madison and Quinn, to find some information on the missing persons or past unsolved deaths. Before going to bed I headed downstairs to the living room, to open up the package that came by on my birthday. I got scissors and tore off the tape, it was a simple brown box with my name on it in cursive. The inside had several pictures of me, a combination of pictures when I was outside on my birthday with Zenix and pictures from when I was a child, with a purple flower necklace in a little bag. I was confused at first by the pictures, especially the once with Lawrence in it, but when I looked closely at the bag with the necklace I recognized the handwriting to be my moms. I shrugged it off, putting the necklace on and keeping in mind to send my mom a very very late thank you text for the present.