Chapter 8 [Dark Tower's Call]

Hillwood was a small town, Away from the noise and people, it mostly rained because the town had mountains all over the view, it felt like a fairytale when you first stepped into Hillwood, the smell of rain and worked-up ground always gave the visitors chills, houses were next to each other, even market was twenty seconds away from most people, but there wasn't much to do. the town has two schools, one bank, twenty-four supermarkets, three fish markets and one good old cinema which shows movies that were released three-four years ago.

three miles away from that cinema there was Winter's household, exactly next to Leblanc's family.

the house was still, the air was flowing across the rooms, and chilling winter was approaching, but Ethan was preparing to face the winter and its challenges with his friends. as they were packing their bags to go to that exact address shown on the envelope, Ethan quickly took a sneak to Crystal's bag.

"Crys, you are missing a flashlight, and a charger" Ethan yelled out, the voice met Crystal in the kitchen where she was snacking on Cereal.

"Can you throw those in there, please? I'm almost done" Crystal replied.

Ethan did as he was told and quickly packed everything into her bag, he tried to look for Claire but she was behind him packing as well.

"Please, don't stay behind me after everything that has happened, it gives me creeps," Ethan said calmly.

"Well, first of all, that thing wasn't me, and second of all, Who else is gonna protect you from a spooky wig ghost next time?" Claire chuckled.

Ethan smiled and looked over the backpacks, everyone was packed and ready to hit the road, if they walked to that destination it would take them exactly three and a half hours.

"I'm going to leave a voice mail to my mom, I suggest you both do the same thing" as Ethan was speaking Claire took her phone out and started talking, it was probably her dad, she had a pretty rough patch with her mom so it was best if she spoke to her father, he wasn't as strict as her mom anyways. a month ago when Claire was leaving for a party next door she made a promise to her mom that she would've been back by midnight, but that didn't happen. when she came back half of her favorite posters were ripped in half. that should explain a little about her relationship.

"I just did, my mom gave me some cash as well so we can buy snacks on our way" Crystal replied.

Ethan shut the door, took a few steps back, looked in the house, breathed the fresh air and rainy droplets for the first time, and started walking, distancing himself from his house after a very long time. this was needed, no matter what this envelope holds it was still worth it, he needed to refresh his memory once and for all.

as they were walking you could see old structures glaring at them, buildings that were abandoned by others, footsteps were loud, splashing in rain, making enough noise to alert frogs and birds to move away. almost half of the buildings felt empty, mostly because everyone leaves Hillwood for winter, it gets very cold and it almost always rains, for someone that sounds like hell, and for others like heaven.

"You know, I always wanted our group to stay together and as we aged we would visit each other and share a glass of wine in the evenings" Claire murmured, tapping her shoes exactly in the puddle.

"We are gonna age, hopefully," Crystal replied, she quickly turned around and started glaring at the distanced town. " but, we are missing one member, aging without him is gonna be very different".

as Ethan heard Crystal's speech his face went from relaxed to worried, he was trying to escape exactly this conversation, but he had to talk about this, hiding this deep sorrowful feeling from others isn't going to give him justice. " It's gonna be horrible, and weird, but he would want us to stay together, and that's exactly what we are doing now" Ethan replied.

" Well, I'm sure walking into a dungeon or whatever it's called 'Dark Tower' isn't exactly what he would want but, I'll take it" Claire chuckled again. it was surprising for both of them, Claire didn't make a lot of jokes nor was she the funny type, but this new adaptation of hers was truly a blessing at this moment.

Ethan finally laughed in a while and grabbed Claire into his arms as he started closing his other arm to Crystal. " I love you guys," he said, he meant it, all of it, He truly loved his friends the most, not everyone is gonna go on a crazy adventure with you in the middle of nowhere just to make you feel better.

"Okay, okay, guys, look." Crystal tilted her head left to analyze if what she was seeing was indeed real, Two huge buildings lying on top of each other, it was beautiful but abandoned, in the middle of the tower where the buildings meet each other there was the same Crow symbol with roses coming out of its sockets. the tower was almost entirely darkened, there was nothing you could see inside but some broken windows shed some light on its insides.

"We are here" Ethan put his envelope down as he spoke, "this is the Dark Tower"