Image by Ivana Cajina from Unsplash

***

Mike stood behind the SUV, peering inside without approaching. He must have been watching me. Was it better to gamble he was unaware I suspected him and walk into the forest together or to race off and reveal I didn't trust him? Who knew if the spirit could give him super speed or help him leap onto moving vehicles?

I undid my seatbelt before pressing the journal and Milo to my chest, careful to conceal the book behind the animal. Mrs. Crawford had been building the sundial to ward off spirits that led to her death before anyone else, or so it appeared by the state of the other fresh body, so she must have known enough about the spiritual world to be targeted.

I swung the door open and smiled at my husband or whatever was leeching off him. He stiffened.

"Sorry, our call got cut off. Afterward, Milo was antsy, so I came to let him roam the park."

"The park along the restricted woods?" Mike drew closer.

"I-uh- it seemed close. I wanted some air too. Today has been stressful." I met his gaze to sell my lie.

"Is there something you aren't telling me?" He was almost at my side.

"I love your eyes when the moonlight hits them just right?" I fought a grimace as I took a step toward the park. Why was I so bad at this? My life depended on it.

Real Mike would have chuckled, shook his head, and called me a deflecting cornball. This one studied me like he'd been doing most of the night.

Keep it together, Winston. You've been suspicious as hell all day, and he didn't crack this. These spirits aren't that bright. You've got this, my inner voice coached.

He tilted his head. "I doubt it's that. First, you discover Mrs. Crawford, next you run into the woods alone for that cat, then you disappear in our backyard with a knife where the police later find a body." His eyes locked with mine, and the creases in his forehead deepened like cracks in arid soil.

"What are you saying?"

Mike shrugged and tucked his hands in his pockets. "I'm making sense of these facts. At the doctor's office, Dr. Fisher questioned your mental health. I assured her you were in shock, but I'm beginning to doubt myself."

My palms grew warmer, and beats of sweat formed. "You think I was connected to those murders?"

A pinecone crunched like shattering bone as Mike stepped closer. "You've been quieter than usual. You're hiding something."

I gripped Milo tighter as he shifted in my arms. "I've never murdered anyone."

Instead of agreeing or arguing with me, his eyes grew sympathetic and a forced smile materialized on his dry lips. "It's understandable your brain is protecting you from your actions."

"Excuse me?"

"It's a coping mechanism, one you've probably used for a long time."

As he continued to advance toward me, I retreated toward the trailhead in the park with small steps, keeping my gaze on him. Crows cawed above us.

"It's okay if you're scared. You're a powerful man in strong physical shape. Who else has the strength to cut the arms clean off a person?"

The corpse in the woods flashed before my eyes, and I swallowed the vomit that rose in my throat. The acid burned. "How do you—?"

"Potts showed me a picture of what they found behind our cabin. Three dismembered bodies, including a boy from your soccer team." His eyes widened, and he covered his mouth with his hand.

"Three? No," I muttered. My skin grew ice cold. How were there three? I'd only seen one. Who'd been hurt on the team? 

Mike continued following me toward the trailhead. "You collided with me in such a hurry. I wouldn't have noticed any blood, and it's impossible for me to tell which is yours and theirs. It was a clever plan to injure yourself."

"I'm not a—"

"It's okay, Winston. I can help you." As he stepped closer, Milo's claws dug into my arm.

"I don't need help!" I shouted.

His voice softened, "After what happened with you and your mother, any person would."

"Excuse me?" My heart thundered in my chest. I'd never spoken about my mom except to mention that she passed when I was a boy.

He was so close his earthy scent grew overpowering. "Your father told me. They found you with her dead body, blood on your hands and face. I have to credit him. I wouldn't have had the strength to raise you after that. The fear he must have felt."

Did my father believe that, or was the earth spirit messing with my head? Was that why he was so strict, he thought I had killed my mother? When she said the spirit could trick someone into feeding them, is that what she meant? Had I done it and had I fabricated a story to protect myself? I closed my eyes.

No, my father wouldn't train a son he thought was a killer to be in peak physical shape. He would have gotten me help.

"You can only deny reality for so long before it strikes again and worse," Mike said.

My skin and lips were freezing. Only Milo's warmth spread through my shirt.

"The police are looking for you, but if we talk to them together, I can defend you. You've never made threats on my life. We'll get you the help you need, especially if you weren't aware when it happened."

Why would the spirit want me emprisoned? Hadn't the voice spoken of dismembered limbs and wanting mine too? How could it accomplish that in prison? Maybe I was the one losing my mind. Were Mike's unease and different behaviour justified while I fabricated reasons to justify my innocence? Who the hell believed in earth spirits and magic?

A crow swooped down, landing on the nearby swing set. I kept retreating further from the SUV. 

My hands trembled, and my heart raced. I had done terrible things. My feet had carried me to the trailhead where the tall pines blocked out most of the moonlight. If I'd committed those heinous acts, the woods could punish me as it saw fit.

"Just hand me Milo, and we'll face this together."

Milo's claws dug deeper into my arm and torso until my skin burned.

Milo.

Why would Mike want this cat? As the animal's warmth drove away the evening's chill, my mind sharpened. My mother's spells had fought the spirit's coldness with heat. The spirits had only haunted me when we'd left Milo in the van at the medical clinic. He was my protection, and that was why I kept running to save him. An unconscious part of me sensed his power. If he was protecting me, I couldn't be the villain. I still had to defeat it.

"You're right, Mike. I need to take responsibility for my actions. But I must face my crimes to understand the magnitude of what I've done."

It would have been easiest to drive to Mrs. Crawford's, but I couldn't risk the cops and Mike noticing the journal and suspecting my plan, so instead, I led him down the forest path I'd run hundreds of times, hoping this wouldn't be my last.

"When did you suspect something was wrong?" I asked to reassure him I agreed with his plan. The longer he remained calm, the longer the woods would be too.

"You were the only person unafraid of the statues. I had to ask myself why someone wouldn't fear their presence... unless they knew the apparitions weren't the real threat."

Those statues had strange energy, and I suspected they were part of the earth spirit's plan.

"My family is against superstitions and magic."

"And I believed that at first too." Spirit Mike was good at being sympathetic.

"What changed your mind?"

He eyed me again and Milo. "You were running more often and for longer and holding more practices at the school these past weeks. The jogs give you time in the woods to commit these crimes. When that statue landed on our doorstep, you forced me to stop so you could face it. Once Officer Potts mentioned the bodies, it all made sense. The statue called to you like it had to target those people. You couldn't act logically because you weren't in control of your actions."

He was partially right. Something had called to me at the house, but it had been Milo, bringing me to the body. He'd needed me to understand the earth spirit's crimes. An icy shiver travelled down my spine, but I pushed myself to keep walking.

Mike, or possessed Mike, had butchered those people. He'd have the police lock me up, so the townspeople didn't suspect any magic. That or he'd kill me in the forest and claim self-defence. Had I walked right into his plan?

I turned to him and forced a smile. "Thank you for caring enough to get me help."

"Of course, sweetheart. It's not your fault."

The crinkle in his eyes betrayed the slight satisfaction in his statement. He knew I was innocent, but wanted me to blame myself.

More crows squawked in the trees above like they might to signal they'd found a carcass. I was a dead man walking, but I had to press on until I reached Mrs. Crawford's sundial.