Preview For
The Woods
By Hazel E. Baumgartner
“I dreamed about her again. The same dream I’ve had a million times. I’m there again, in California. I’m walking through the woods, it’s dark and foggy, I round a tree, she’s standing there with tears on her face, and I wake up.”
“Tom, you’re still grieving. It’s natural.”
“No, no, it’s been almost thirty years now. When you’re young, you… you don’t want to believe that bad things just happen sometimes. You want an explanation. You want a reason. You want things to make sense.”
“And does that make sense to you?”
“Now, now. Everything will be alright. When this kind of thing happens, though, the first twenty-four hours are the most important. Ninety percent of the time, ma’am, when this kind of thing happens they’re just out playing in the woods someplace.”
“I talked to mom the other day on the phone. She’s doing good, all things considered. She’s excited for the Mother’s Day trip. I know we really shouldn’t be traveling during a pandemic, but neither of us have seen her in almost a year. Hell, I haven’t seen Jace in almost a year.”
“There’s something you’re not telling me, isn’t there?”
“She thinks Harmony’s coming.”
The bear emerged from the bedquarters at the back of the trailer while both men’s eyes were down. Dingo barked and turned tail out of the trailer, and the sudden sound startled the bear, who roared a terrifying, bellowing roar. In the close quarters of the trailer it sounded like a freight train horn, or a bomb going off. Both men snapped back up and raised their guns, but Callahan only got two shots off before they were knocked back as the bear charged out of the trailer. Callahan was thrown clear of the deck entirely by the bear’s weight, which hit him like a freight truck, and he felt a sharp, stabbing pain in his chest as his ribs collapsed into his lungs. His ears rang from the roar and the gunshots, and panicked he cried out for the dog, unsure of its whereabouts.
Something was moving outside the truck. Listening carefully, he could hear the thump-thump of footsteps approaching him. Then, the thing that had crossed the highway in front of him stepped back into view through the windshield. It was big, taller than any man Jimbo had ever seen, though it walked on two legs like a man. It was covered in tangled orangish-brown hair from head to toe that somewhat shrouded the shape of its body. Its face and upper chest were hairless, deep black skin juxtaposed dramatically against the golden-red hair that covered the rest of the thing. Beady black eyes, deepset below a heavy brow ridge, watched him menacingly.
“That looks like a damn big bear… or a damn big something. Tom, it could’ve been the one who took Harmony.”
“Since we were children, we’ve been fighting with a monster in these woods. He’s as mean as he is big. He doesn’t want us here. He’s never wanted us here.”
The barrage of thrown items against the house stopped almost as soon as Jason shut the back door. Tom, Elise, and Isabel waited in the living room in silence for what seemed like a year, the slumbering children’s snoozes and the ticking of a clock the only sounds for miles around. Suddenly, there was another crashing noise near the back of the house. Tom heard Jason yell outside, followed by four sharp gunshots from the twenty-two. Elise yelped in fear, causing the children to stir. There was a horrendous howling noise outside, like that of a gigantic coyote, and then a sound like an automobile accident, and then… silence.
Hazel E. Baumgartner’s
“THE WOODS”
Out now wherever books are sold online
Hazel E. Baumgartner - Author 