Sunday, September 25th, 2016

Everything went blurry after that, and Sid felt like he had been dreaming. As if all of it had just been a nightmare. Everything he saw, everything he witnessed, it all seemed to be one big bad nightmare.

The soccer ball, the tree branch, the strong gusts of wind that seemed to chase him throughout the woods. The feeling of being pushed multiple times. But what had startled him most, what had caused him to wake up as shocked as he felt, was the fact he remembered flying through the air, and seeing a small girl, with black hair in a white dress, standing in front of him. She wasn't facing him, but a black cloud of smoke swirled around them, shielding him from his friends, while a faint weird voice repeatedly said 'he's mine' before darkness took over.

It should've been a dream, but he damn well knew it wasn't. They went into those woods, and they experienced all of those things for real.

"What were you even thinking!?" his father Harold yelled in anger, pacing up and down the living room. "The Miller woods!?"

Sid had woken up at the early hours of the day, on the couch in the Bray' residence. Both sets of parents were present, and Davy. He didn't remember how he got there, when their parents found out, and where Edward went, which kind of freaked him out seeing his last memories.

"I guess we weren't thinking," Davy replied in a mutter, shamefully staring towards the floor while Sid was mainly focused on trying to ignore the headache that had instantly presented itself when he opened his eyes.

Whatever punishment awaited them; Sid didn't care. He was solely relieved and glad to be out of those woods alive. He had never felt so scared in his entire life as he had felt in that forest, running from whatever was chasing them. No wonder Cory went crazy; he had been younger, alone, and in there for way longer than them.

One thing that Davy and Sid agreed on in complete silence, was not to tell their parents exactly what had happened. Sid didn't want to be treated as if he was crazy. Nobody would believe them anyway, just like nobody had seemed to believe Cory.

"Sid! Are you even listening? I asked a question?" his mom snapped, waking him up from his train of thoughts.

"I'm sorry," Sid mumbled, covering his eyes. "I'm having a hard time focusing..."

"Guys," Janet Bray, Davy's mother, spoke up. "Sid probably has a concussion. The preaching can wait until he recovered. I think all three of them know damn well they are in a lot of trouble. Let's just be glad we got them out before the cops got involved." She pulled Davy into her arms protectively. "Promise me you will never go back to those woods, ever again."

Davy nodded, hugging his mother back with his eyes closed. The fact he allowed her to pamper him in Sid's presence, told Sid that he wasn't the only one freaking out over the events that happened.

"I suggest Sid will take a nap here, while we talk things over. Davy and Annika can watch him to make sure we really don't need to take him to a hospital," Harold said. "I'm a doctor, not an X-ray machine."

Sid didn't need to hear that twice, hurrying after Davy towards the attic, where both him and Annika had their bedrooms. He changed clothes, into clean sweatpants and a shirt, laying down in Davy's bed with a deep sigh. He wasn't planning on sleeping, and neither was Davy, who sat down on his desk chair.

It remained silent for a while, even though they both seemed full of questions. Sid really didn't want to answer them, though on the other hand, he wanted Davy to confirm that he remembered things correctly. That he wasn't simply losing his mind.

He had somewhat expected either Davy to be the one to start talking, but it was Edward who called; answering Sid's main question. At least he was alive, out, and able to call Davy.

"Dude—" Davy answered the phone once it was on speaker.

"How's Sid?"

"Awake," Davy looked at him with a worried look. "Silent, which isn't like him. But... I guess we're all still in shock."

"Well, I'm about to shock you more," Edward said with a weird voice. "Did you take a look at the pictures we took? At the beginning?"

"No," Davy said, huffing. "When was I supposed to check them? Before or during the scolding from our parents?"

"You're answering your phone, so I assumed you had time."

"I do now," Davy grumbled, swiping on his screen as he walked over to the bed, sitting down in a way that enabled Sid to look at the photo's that he opened.

"What about them?" Sid asked, leaning up on an elbow.

"Are they normal? Is there anything out of the ordinary?"

"They're... normal? I don't know what you mean," Davy replied, scrolling through the pictures back and forth.

"Remember the pictures I took when we reached the lake?" Edward asked, right before a message popped up, telling them Edward had sent them files—possibly the pictures. "Check behind Sid."

It was one single picture of Davy and Sid seated in front of the lake. It had been moments before everything went haywire. In that moment, in that picture, they were still smiling like nothing was wrong.

But Sid's eyes grew wider as he noticed a pair of eyes behind him, and he yelped in surprise. Why the hell where there eyes behind them, staring at them from the banks of the lake?

"They're in nearly every picture I took after that. Not to freak you out Sid, but they seem to follow you around."

"What?" Sid squeaked, not wanting to hear such a thing.

"They're in all the pictures I have of you. I don't know about the way back. I obviously didn't have time to take more pictures. But you're the one that got a lesson in flying in there."

"All I had was the feeling of being scratched," Davy said, pointing at his neck. There were scratch marks visible, eerily similar to the ones Sid had in his neck.

"Aside from the gusts of wind that knocked me over, I'm fine... physically." Edward mumbled. "But it's done now, right? We just have to agree not to talk about any of this."

It was easier said than done, not to talk about any of the events, with anyone. Sid wasn't able to get much sleep, because Annika soon woke him up when she learned they had been in the woods that night. She had slept straight through the phone call from Davy, asking their father for help. She didn't wake up from the loud voices once they got home, and both sets of parents had asked numerous questions as to what happened.

Davy hadn't answered any questions, and thanked Sid he threw up in that exact moment, distracting the parents from their activities. They made sure Sid was going to be fine before they started lecturing them.

Annika missed it all.

"What the hell, guys?" she hissed, shaking Sid even though he had already opened his eyes. "You went into Miller Woods!?"

"Can you keep it down?" Davy asked, yawning and stretching his arms, swirling around the desk chair. "Sid has a concussion and needs rest."

"Why are you up already?" Sid asked Davy confused, ignoring Annika's pleading look to give her answers.

"Honestly, I couldn't sleep. That shit freaked me out good. But I'm good now. We probably were too stoned, right? It wasn't real."

"So, I accidentally tripped and flew through the air to end up with a concussion because I was stoned?" Sd dryly asked, pushing himself up, but groaning as an exploding headache required him to instantly lay back down.

"Guys!" Annika hissed again, "what happened?"

"Some crazy stuff. Let's say Cory had every reason to go crazy in there," Sid replied with a soft voice, closing his eyes again, "that forest is fucked up."

"But we're out. Mom and Dad and Harold picked us up and we weren't caught by the cops. We learned our lesson. Let's scrap Brook Mansion from our list of haunted places to visit as well. I'm not stupid."

Sid nodded in agreement. No more haunted places for them.

"You do realize the army was there and they found a hole in the fence, right? They know there had been someone trespassing," Annika pointed out, showing an article on her phone about the discovery of the hole they had made that night. "They'll find out who went in one way or another."

"They won't. The power was out. If the fence was without power, everything was," Davy grumbled, crossing his arms, "and mom and dad agreed not to call them because we would get in major trouble. Don't ask me why they forbid us from coming clean."

"All I know is that I don't care why," Sid mumbled tiredly, "We walk away from this being grounded. We could've been worse off."

"Yeah!" Annika slapped his arm annoyed, but then sighed and sat down next to him, pushing hair out of his face, "I'm just glad you guys are okay. Mom's worried about what happened in the woods, since you called for help after admitting you had been in the woods, instead of trying to hide the truth."

"Sometimes it's better to get adults involved," Davy told her while he waved a lecturing finger at her, "I might be stubborn, I'm not stupid."

Sid snorted and retorted: "You're both."

Annika chuckled and Sid could only imagine Davy rolling his eyes at him since he kept his eyes close, enjoying the little touches from Annika. Thank God, they hadn't asked the girls to join them, knowing Amber would definitely want to go. She would also most definitely go into full on panic mode and run around like a chicken who had just lost its head.

Annika would've tried to make too much sense of everything, slowing their attempt to escape down too much, while Amara would probably complain about a lost fingernail or something.

Neither would have given them much chance to get away.

Still, Sid felt like they needed to inform Amber of what had happened. Amara would definitely hear from Edward what had happened, since they told each other everything, and Annika knew because Sid was her boyfriend and Davy her brother. Amber couldn't feel left out. For that, their friendship was too important.

"I think we should keep this between the six of us. We tell Amber, Amara will hear from Edward, and that's it. Nobody needs to know."

"What about Cory?"

"Not even Cory."

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