Deep In The Forest. Chapter 3.

—Time to settle accounts, Mr. and Mrs. Turpin. —Kevin said, looking into the eyes of the parents of his current girlfriend, Lia. —Or rather, time to settle accounts, uncle and aunt.

[...]

15 hours before

Ring. Ring. Ring.

—Huh? Josh, good morning. —Isabella saluted.

The young woman yawned at the same time she rubbed her eyes. Josh got out of bed and turned off the alarm that was beeping too irritatingly.

—It looks like a tornado passed through your hair. —He said with a mocking smile.

—Haha. Shut up for once.

The atmosphere felt so calm until that moment. Strangely quiet. Maybe it meant a bad omen? Actually, Isabella did not know and she was sure she did not want to know either.

—It is ten minutes to nine. We must hurry if we do not want to be late for lunch. —Josh warned.

—Oh, I almost forgot that. —She said as she got up from the comfortable sofa and took her clothes in his hands —Umm, I will use your bathroom, okay?

—Ah... S-sure, Isabella.

—Okay? You are acting weird. —Despite that little detail, Isabella ignored him.

—It is not that, I just want you to hurry.

The female headed for the bathroom, then, but before closing the door, Josh whispered something that she could not quite hear.

[...]

After three long hours, they had already reached Isabella's parents' cabin. She was still scared by the dangerous Animalus. And to think that she had slept peacefully so many nights and enjoyed peacefully during her short fourteen years, without imagining for a second those evil presences that inhabited the forest.

How deluded she was.

She opened the main door with the key that her parents had given her a few months ago and made the gesture of greeting her mother, telling her that she was already there, but she noticed something that made her blood run cold. Kevin came down the stairs of the home with a suitcase in his hands and his hair wet as if he had taken a shower.

—Good morning darling. —The older woman greeted and four pairs of eyes turned to see her. —Ah, I see you are coming with Josh. Come in.

—Good morning, ma'am. This... my mother allowed me to stay with you until after lunch.

—How good! The more the better. —Her father spoke.

Isabella approached her mother as fast as she could, forgetting to greet her entirely. She needed to clear up the doubts inside her head. First, What was Kevin doing there? And most importantly, Why did he appear as if he had spent the night with his parents and sisters?

—Mommy. The elder woman made an umm with her lips, hinting that she was listening. —Why is Kevin at the cabin so early?

She just laughed as if that was normal. —Kevin stayed the night yesterday. He went for his clothes at his house and came back... Why so desperate, darling?

—Nothing, Mom. It seemed strange to me because we just met him. —She answered.

—Kevin strikes me as an honest person. Your sister has chosen well this time. —She said.

—Well, what about lunch? —Isabella asked, changing the conversation.

—Ah, I forgot to tell you yesterday. We will go to Crystal Lagoon.

—Okay, I will go fix myself up a bit. I will be right back. —And then, Isabella came out of the kitchen.

When she entered the room, she noticed that the sheets on her bed were a mess. She did not recall fixing them yesterday, yet she faced the worst scare of her life when she approached it.

Manly perfume and fox fur.

She exploded. She could no longer keep it just for her. Everyone should know. Her parents had to know, they had to know that Kevin was a dangerous guy, just like the place where they lived. They had to know this secret that was devouring her alive. Isabella wanted him out of the cabin, she wanted him out of her mind.

She was crying when she called her mother, who along with Josh, tried to reassure her in vain. The girl told them that someone had slept in her bed last night. She pointed to the remains of fox hair and asked them to smell the sheets.

—Isabella, you are imagining things. There is none of that. —The older woman asserted.

It couldn't be true, there it was. Kevin had left his... Where was the alleged evidence?

Then her mother left the room puzzled and left her alone with Josh.

—Isabella, you must understand one thing. —She looked at him, her face wet with tears. Her breathing was ragged.

—They won't believe you if you tell them what we discovered yesterday. They will think that we are crazy, even if we show them the evidence, they will say that it is nonsense that someone invented. It is crucial that it is only between us, Do you understand?

Maybe it was true, that is, if she had been warned about that tribe before, she would assume that she had not believed a single word. She would think it was a bad joke. However, sometimes, there are events that, although they are not proven or are unknown by society, can become real. And we, as humans, are completely ignorant of that. But the question remained immovable from her head. What if that author was still alive? Would he believe them? Or rather...

Would he help them?

Isabella did not have time to refute Josh, because when she was about to do so, his father announced that it was time to leave for the lagoon. She got up from the floor and wiped her pants a bit. The truth had to be told someday.

[...]

They took a short walk and when they were at their destination, they spread out the picnic blankets and distributed the food. Everyone was happy, even Josh. Isabella believed that he too would be scared by the portraits they saw yesterday or by what that witness mentioned. But he did not. He acted as if everything was normal.

She got a little angry about it, Did not he care about her situation? Surely her mental health had gone to the dump since the holidays began. She just had been eating alone for thirty minutes in front of the lagoon when her vision darkened.

Everything was black around her, the trees had disappeared as well as her family. Only the lagoon remained that began to change color until it became a navy blue tone. She could not, no matter how hard she tried, even make out algae or fish under the water.

Then, she was able to watch something rise from the pond. It was the tail of an animal, more like a fox.

—Okay, it doesn't matter, Isabella. —She said to herself. —Just calm down and avoid having an emotional breakdown right now. Take it easy.

However, that was not enough to return her heart rate to normal. That tail moved, floating in the lagoon and getting closer to where she was. She could not run, she was so scared that her muscles did not respond.

Just when the tail was on the shore, very close to her, she stopped. She heard a growl near her back and turned quickly, but she did not notice anything. When she returned to put her gaze on the pond, a very angry fox jumped out of it.

—Help! —She tried to get that animal off her, but she was just kicking at nothing —But what...?

—Isabella, Are you okay? —Her mother asked worried about her. —What happens?

«There was an animal there, I swear. Why do I keep seeing things where there are none?» thought Isabella.

—Nothing, Mom. —She answered, embarrassed.

—Oh, Isabella. Well, it does not matter. We already have to go, it is getting dark.

At the end of the day, she said goodbye to Josh. He did not say anything and just left. But inside Josh, something screamed that he should get Isabella out of there. He frowned even as he was about to ask her to sleep again in his bedroom. He did not understand why and just ignored it. Maybe, just maybe, if he had done what his heart and mind were crying out at the same time, this story would end differently. Despite that, Josh never did anything.

The Turpin family arrived at the cabin in the dark. Isabella was so lost in her thoughts that she did not notice a precise detail in time: there would be a full moon that night. Kevin wished everyone on the first floor good night, but she refused to return the gesture. Little or nothing she wanted to know about him and when she closed the door at last she was able to expel all the air that she had been holding in her lungs.

She dressed in pajamas and brushed her teeth, however, before falling asleep she had to go down to the kitchen to talk to her mother.

—Mom. —She called. The elder woman looked at her with a smile, waiting for her to speak. —I have a question.

—What is wrong, dear?

—Who has prepared the food? —She asked and was glad she had not wavered.

Isabella was afraid, of course, she was, of the answer she expected. The nerves were eating into her inside, while she prayed that the answer was not the one she had in mind. «Please, Mom, tell me it is not true».

—Kevin did it, Isabella.

And then she went to sleep.