29: …the storm

The night was dark and had less activity than usual. Sophie had decided to call an uber to get to the cemetery. It wasn’t too far away. She had dressed for a date to fool Chloe. She couldn’t let her in at that moment. Sophie had pinned a four-star restaurant near the cemetery as her destination. She didn’t want to come across as a weirdo who visits the dead looking like a piñata. The car raced to the cemetery in the dark and gloomy night. Sophie’s mind kept bombarding her with worries and negative thoughts. She wondered what she could find. She could be received by Aaron with another lousy excuse or he could straight up ghost her. She wondered what she would do in either of those circumstances. The car screeched to a halt. They had arrived at the restaurant. There was minimal traffic on the road, keeping in mind the time of the night. She daydreamed the possibility of sharing a dinner table with Aaron in a restaurant like that on a night like this. The thought reminded her of the night she almost got herself shot and got her hand sliced by a broken wine glass. She shook off the thought. She paid the uber and walked to the cemetery. It took her moments to reach the cemetery but a while to get inside. The cemetery ground was huge but had only two gates. She finally entered after a long walk. She regretted arriving there wearing heals. A pair of joggers would have been way better but Chloe would have seen right through it.

The cemetery was deserted and looked gloomy. There were no signs of any visitors. The leafless trees looked eerie and alive. Sophie walked through the relatively welcoming green pasture at the entrance and entered the area with graves. She had hated visiting cemeteries and graveyards even with company. This visit was taking a toll on her. She remembered what Aaron had told her and looked for the biggest tree around her. It took her a while of stumbling through the taunting half dead trees but she eventually found it. The leafless giant stood taller than a two-story building. Owls used its high branches as vantage points as they awaited their preys to emerge from the graves. The silence was unnerving. The chirps of the crickets and the hoots of the gigantic owls were the only audible sounds. She neared the tree and flicked on her flashlight. She found an arrow scratched on the bark of the tree. It pointed to the left. A rock lied flat at the direction and a piece of paper peeked from underneath it. She picked it up. The paper contained instructions supposedly left by Aaron. It instructed her to get to the grave digger’s hut. She was getting tired of the riddles. She looked around and found a lone lantern light in the distance. The lantern hung at the door of the grave digger’s hut. She had to make her way through hundreds of graves to get there. If it turned out to be a joke, she was going to reserve one of these graves for Aaron. She walked through the graves and finally arrived at the hut. It looked and sounded deserted. Everything around it, except the lit lantern, suggested that the hut had been abandoned for some time. The surroundings were too creepy for her taste. She was in two minds. She contemplated ditching this entire exercise but doing so would give Aaron another excuse. She decided to see it through. She inched closer to the door. A dead rat’s carcass lied beside the walkway. It reminded her about the bone necklace Aaron had given her and stressed so much about. She pulled it out of her purse and wore it. The necklace felt heavier than it looked. She walked to the door and opened it.

The inside of the hut was pitch dark. She flicked her flash light on and stepped inside. As Sophie had feared, the hut was abandoned. Only a bunch of broken furniture and garden tools lied around. She was convinced that her visit had been a waste of time so she turned back to leave. Just as she did, she heard creaking of the floor boards from inside the hut. She turned back to see what made that noise. She walked deeper into the hut and swiveled her flashlight around her. As she walked further, she realized that the ceiling was destroyed and full moon could be seen from the inside. She looked up momentarily before looking back down to find Aaron or some clue left by him. The floor creaked again. This time closer to her. Sophie was badly startled by the noise and she almost dropped the flashlight. Entire hut shook this time around. She was trembling. “Whatever it is, it’s huge”, she deducted from the shake. She wanted to race out of the hut but her legs didn’t respond to her brain. A loud growl was heard inside the hut. Once it started, it didn’t stop. Just as she was trying to make a sense of it, she caught a pair of glowing eyes, staring right at her from the darkness. She quickly aimed her flashlight at the eyes, letting out a loud gasp. A ten feet tall wolf, standing on its hind legs glared at her, ready to pounce. The muscles were more than intimidating and the eyes glowed like hot coals. The creature’s arms almost touched the ground as it stood and its entire frame shifted a foot up and down as it puffed. Sophie stared in disbelief and dropped the flashlight. It took her a moment to recognize the mythological beast she didn’t hope to meet tonight. She stepped back to evacuate. The werewolf pounced at her. She wanted to scream but only soundless air came out of her mouth as she fell to the ground on her back. The beast was above her in a blink of an eye. It stared into her soul as it stood above her with its paws firmly planted at either side of her. She gawked at it, failing to make a sound or a movement. Tears flowed through her eyes at that moment of despair and crippling fear. The monstrous beast looked like a death incarnate. She was certain that she was going to be the beast’s dinner. The beast’s drool landed inches beside her face and she squirmed.
“Aaron?”, she barely managed. The beast ignored it like nothing had left her mouth at all. She closed her eyes as she braced herself for a fatal swipe. The growls abruptly stopped. She opened her eyes. The beast was sniffing at her neck. The werewolf recoiled and retreated into the darkness, whimpering. She struggled to move her hands but as soon as she succeeded, she put her hand on the exact spot that was sniffed by the beast. She could still feel the strong exhales from the beast landing on that spot. As she put her hand there, she found the bone necklace given to her by her lover. She closed her eyes and exhaled in relief. She lied on the ground for a while, struggling to get up. The thought that the beast was still in the same establishment as herself, helped a lot in pushing her back on her feet.

Sophie staggered out of the hut and shut the door behind her. She was trying to wrap her head around what she had just witnessed. There was no denying it now. She had just witnessed a werewolf in the flesh and had almost been devoured by it. Most importantly, it was probably the man she had fallen in love with. The beast would wreak havoc in the city, if it left the hut, she thought. She took her necklace off and hung it on the door. She believed if the necklace was enough to repel the werewolf from her face, it just might contain it inside the hut. The hoots of the owls and the chirps of the crickets sounded a lot more ominous than they did minutes ago. She dashed through the graves and paced out of the cemetery. She hailed a taxi and wondered how she was supposed to explain that to Chloe, if she was to let her in at all.