Andrea Barbosa
Location: Hot Springs, North Carolina.
Population: 530
I was five years old when my heart was shot and shattered into hundreds of little pieces. My dog Sadie ran into the forest behind our house, chasing after a bright green tennis ball, tossed in there by my older cousin David on a dare. He claimed that whatever goes into those woods does not come out. My brother and I didn’t believe him. We were young and gullible but the forest was something we grew up with; it seemed inviting and it was calling. We would lift our chins high up in the air as if we were looking up at the giants we read in our fairy tales. There standing before us, were the tallest trees we had ever seen, reaching their branches into the heavens. And when the leaves danced in the wind, the forest called out with its own siren, similar to the ones that the mermaids used when they would appear in our dreams. When the remaining visibility of the tennis ball finally diminished into the mist we waited and waited. We even called out her name a couple of times. I anticipated seeing her furry golden face appear from the now unsettling giants whispering only a couple of feet away from us. I was getting anxious and I could tell Wyatt was too.
“That’s it I’m going after her,” he said. Wyatt, only two years older than me, was already very mature for his age. He was protective over me and loved Sadie just as much if not a little more. He took a few steps forward but then turned around. “Stay here” he shakingly said. Turning back around, he began to take a few more steps forward. Then for a second time, he stopped, took a deep breath, turning to look me in my eyes, he bravely said, “I will protect you”. My brother Wyatt was only two years older than me but he already knew how to make me feel safe and protected. Wyatt took two more steps forward before our parents came running out of the house.
“Kids get away from the trees! Wyatt get over here right now!” my mother yelled. Mothers, the protectors in our life, our guidances, mama bears sworn to fear away any danger that might come near her little cubs…. But not Lynn. This was actually one of the only times I have seen her really put her foot down. “What on Earth do you think you are doing young man?” my mother grabbed Wyatt by his shirt and pulled him close to her body as if she was shielding him from the possession of the forest. My father picked me up and David followed. Heading back towards the house I turned around one last time to see if I would finally see Sadie happily trotting back to us. But, nothing. We went inside our one-story run-down tan house with the ugly blue shutters where we explained what we were doing, and why Sadie was no longer with us.
“She ran into the forest!?” my father yelled. This was the first time I saw him actually pay attention to something other than the bottom of a bottle. My father, now clutching onto me for dear life, sat down on the worn-out maroon couch in the corner of the living room- which was unspeakably his designated chair. I quickly jumped out of his lap slightly confused about the sudden care and protection over me. Don’t get me wrong, I like my father, but ‘Dad’ and ‘Love’ are not two words I would have in the same sentence. He would fight for me, maybe for my mother, but he taught Wyatt at an early age how to be a man. How to fight, defend, protect, and survive.
Don’t ask me what he does for a living, I don’t know.
Don’t ask me what his hobbies are, I couldn’t tell you
All I know is that something really messed him and my mom up a long time ago. They refuse to talk about it, but I have started to realize that any mention of the woods sobers them up long enough for them to actually play house for a few hours.
I was seven when the fragments of my shattered heart were bulldozed over and made into a powder that dissipated in the wind the day Wyatt disappeared. He had gone on a class trip that my parents signed off on… but little did their inebriated brains know what they were signing. If they had looked for even a second on the paper they would have seen that this class trip was going through the trails of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and they would have kept Wyatt home. I should have blamed the school for losing the only person I truly loved, I mean my parents weren’t even there on the school trip, but for some reason, they were the ones I blamed. Wyatt was so excited about it that the morning of, he had completely forgotten to eat breakfast and almost wore his favorite red shirt with the stormtroopers on the front, inside out. Once we saw the school bus stop outside our house, we grabbed our raincoats and rain boots and ran out the door. It wasn’t until years later looking back on this moment that I remembered the sight of my passed-out parents. Mom sprawled out on the couch and dad on his worn-out maroon chair with a half-empty beer falling out of his hand. They didn’t wake up to say bye to us, to Wyatt. But we didn’t notice or seem to care because on the bus Wyatt talked my ear off at all the cool animals he had been studying to prepare for this trip. Jumping up and down in his seat he said,
“Like the moose, and there is also the white-tailed deer, I hope I see one of those. Oh and don’t worry Julia, if I find a woodpecker I will draw exactly what it looked like and give it to you. I know those are your favorites.” When he was done talking he took a moment to stop and catch his breath. Talk first breath second should have been this kid’s motto.
The rainy searches for Wyatt went on for two weeks through miles and miles of forest ground, but each time we came up dry. I remembered being in awe the first time I looked up at the trees, and I remember how much they frightened me the second time. We never found Wyatt, and we never found a body, meaning, we never found peace. The gentle sounds of laughing and any sense of happiness that came from Wyatt vanished from our lives and into the forest the same day it took him from us.
I was thirteen when my mother’s guilt and self-inflicted torture finally destroyed her enough to leave my dad and I alone. I would never stay awake long enough to hear the whole thing, the fighting, that is. It first started happening the week after Wyatt’s disappearance. I would sit in my room with my ear to the door as angry words, swears, and frustrations were being thrown back and forth, like a game of tennis. I could never hear what was being said, but one night my mom must have been close to my room because I was able to hear her say,
“You promised me we would leave Henry! You told me we would be out of here before the birth of our first child and look where we are now… our first baby is…”
“DON’T SAY IT. DON’T YOU FUCKING SAY IT” my dad yelled back. I could hear the clanging of glass as he grabbed his newly bought pack of Bud Light into the next room and slammed the door
“My baby Wyatt… oh honey.” I pushed the door slightly open to see my mother gently cradling a baby picture of Wyatt. “Oh my precious baby, they warned us. They told us to leave and we didn’t” she begins sobbing. I had no idea what she was talking about, but after that night I never stayed around to hear them argue again. I would leave through my bedroom window, climb on the logs that were stacked on the side of the house, and go up to the roof. And from that day, the roof became my new safe space, away from the people that were supposed to keep me safe. The day after my mom left, my dad taught me the rules to living in Hot Springs, North Carolina.
Rule #1… Do not go outside at night.
Rule #2… Don’t derail from the trail
And Rule #3… Look away, turn away, walk away. If you hear your name being called… no you didn’t.
I didn’t question my father after that, but I also didn’t have anything else to lose. I didn’t have friends and I didn’t want to make any. School seemed like a drag, so I didn’t go. I didn’t leave my room and we lived too far from town to just go walk around the shops. So instead, when I really missed him the most, I would sneak out my window at night, to walk through our backyard to the Blue Ridge Mountains. I never heard my name being called out, but I also never derailed from the trail. Until I saw a glimpse of a red shirt through the trees. Every bone in my body itched to run through the trees in hopes that I would run into a boy wearing a red shirt with stormtroopers on the front. “Rule #2… Don’t derail from the trail” suddenly began to echo in my head.
“Rule #2… Don’t derail from the trail”
“Rule #2… Don’t derail from the trail”
And for the first time in years, I truly felt sorry for my father. He and my mother were terrified of the forest I stand in now. Just three steps away from derailing from the trail. The same forest that took his only son. The same forest that drove away the only woman he’s ever married. In his life, I was the only one left. So I decided to head back home, refusing to turn around, denying a chance to see that red shirt again.
I was fourteen when I heard my name being called. It was a late September evening. The sun had just set behind the trees when the wind began to pick up a bit, gently shaking the trees that stood beside our house. Before we knew it, darkness covered the sky with rain-filled clouds. I lay in my bed face up looking at the ceiling, just thinking, contemplating, planning. Ever since my mom left, my father’s drinking became worse and worse. He use to leave the house, I’m assuming for whatever job he had at the time, but eventually, he stopped. He became a hermit in his own home. Any time I wanted to leave the house, I would go out my window. I couldn’t look at him. Don’t get me wrong, I would make myself known to him every once in a while. I couldn’t let him think he lost me too, even if at this point he didn’t care that I was here or not. He never left his worn-out maroon couch in the corner of the living room. He seemed to have paused his life. Absentmindedly staring at the dimly light tv screen, lazily holding a half-empty beer can. It almost looked like he was waiting for Wyatt and my mother to walk through the front door.
As I lay in my bed, slowly twisting my hair through my fingers, I hear the sound of a car door slam and the roar of an engine. I jumped out of my bed running to my window. The rain began pouring down and I saw my father’s car swerve out of the driveway. I quickly turned around and ran into the living room where the front door had been left wide open and beer cans littered the space around his chair. He was drunk driving. He left the house at night.
“Rule #1… Do not go outside at night.”
I stormed into his room. I hadn’t been in there in years, since I was six. It looked the exact same. The room was a light shade of Cambridge blue and the bedspread was white with three black throw pillows. The painting above the bed was a knock-off Claude Monet, the same one my mother found at a farmers market. The room was kept the exact same as how she left it. There were two tiny nightstands, only big enough to hold a lamp, on each side of the bed, and a light cream bench at the foot. There was a tiny bookcase in place of where a tv stand would be because my mother did not believe in watching tv before bed. She thought it would give her nightmares. I don’t know much, really anything about my father, except for where he keeps his most important documents. I make a b-line for his closet. I dig and dig looking for what I think should be a tiny metal safe shoved and hidden away in the very back of the closet.
When Wyatt and I were six and eight we went through this hide-and-seek obsession. We would play it every day anytime we were bored, in daylight or darkness. Once I had hidden in my father’s closet, the safe wasn’t stored away and just sat there, slightly open. I decided to climb in, knowing this would be the perfect hiding spot, but the door closed and the automatic locking system clicked in. I was stuck. I began screaming and banging on the walls as hard as my little six-year-old hands could take. I looked around for something that could make louder noise or even get me out. I noticed I was sitting on a stack of papers. And hidden underneath the papers was a tiny plastic bag of mushrooms. Weird.
Why would mommy keep the mushrooms she picked, and hid them from the sun? I thought. It was right then when I heard clicking. The darkness I had been sitting in, for now, fifteen minutes quickly became blinding as the door of the safe was now unlocked and opened by my mother, who did not know we were playing hide and seek. Meaning, that she was not coming into the safe to look for her missing daughter. She screamed when she saw me and called my father over. He stormed in and grabbed me by my arm and pulled me out of the safe. He yelled at Wyatt and me saying that the safe was not to be messed with, it held valuable things mommy and daddy owned that are not toys and have to remain safe. My father rushed us out of the room but they left the door cracked open. Wyatt and I stayed at the door peering in. My father passed the baggie to my mother who pocketed it, and he took a stack of papers out. Once they were brought up in sight, my mother shook her head and stormed into their bathroom. I haven’t been in his room since. I continue to dig around but come up empty.
Shoot. Where would it be?
I turn around and walk to the other side of the room, my mom’s side. Sitting right next to her bed on the floor is an open safe with papers dispersed all over the place, along with a couple of beer cans. Bingo.
I take a seat in the clutter of mess and glance at the first sheet of paper I pick up. It’s property documents. Our property documents.
343 North Medeley Street.
One-story tan house with blue shutters.
Three bed two bath.
Realtor Note: House is at the end of the street, furthest from the rest of the homes in the community.
Closest to the Blue Ridge Mountains.
As I begin to look through the other papers scattered around me, I notice there are more property documents, for some of the other houses in the neighborhood. And I realize that our house is the cheapest out of them all, almost three times less than any other house. Confused, I begin to look around for anything else that could help me figure out where my dad could have gone to. I almost miss it, but I catch a glimpse at something in the very back of the safe, a crumbled-up piece of paper. I open it.
To the new owners of 343 North Medeley Street,
Be wary of the area.
No one buys this house because they want to.
Stay alert to the surrounding forest.
Whether you are in a financial situation or dealing with a personal matter of some sort… get it figured out ASAP.
Get out.
If you are a family with children. GET OUT.
The rules to living in Hot Springs, North Carolina are as follow…
“Rule #1… Do not go outside at night.”
“Rule #2… Don’t derail from the trail”
And Rule #3… Look away, turn away, walk away. If you hear your name being called…no you didn’t.
Sincerely, 343’s previous owners.
My father must have been drinking, gotten into this stuff, and left. He couldn’t take living here another second. They warned him from the beginning to leave, to stay away from whatever dangers lurked beyond our property line. Our backyard was a borderline to the Blue Ridge forest. Just as it took over my mother, my father’s guilt and self-inflicted torture finally allowed him to flee. Leaving me here. His only daughter. His only blood left. Rage took over my body. My face became hot and my skin felt like it was bubbling. My parents were never the best parents, my parents were never sober long enough to be good parents, but they had their reasons. They have been trapped in a hell of their own making. My father never had a job long enough to make enough money to move us out, and my mother stayed at home after Wyatt was born.
But nevertheless.
I never thought he’d abandon me here.
My father could not take it another second. My body froze as it came to my attention that the evil that my father ran from was still here. I was surrounded by it. Alone. Every bit of anger in me quickly vanished, leaving me completely and utterly petrified. I slowly walked out of the room and into the living room. I began to walk over to close the front door when I notice the back door was open. And it was definitely not opened when I first came out into the living room. The rain had stopped but the clouds still loomed over us like a shadow, threatening us with more rain. It had cast an eerie darkness covering the inside of the house. Any “old house” noises that would go on during the day, the static of the TV, or the rustling of the trees, stopped. It was dead silent. I suddenly realized I hadn’t looked away from the back door since I first laid eyes on it. The sight of the emerald green trees shining in from the outside, let in a bit of light. It was bright and it turned the door into a portal. I began to take a few steps forward from the middle of the room. Any fear or anxiety that streamed around inside me left, similar to the way the anger left, but this was gentle. It was warm and made me feel something I haven’t felt in a long time. I had walked close enough that my hand reached the door frame.
The giants- the forest, use to keep me up at night. But when I did get some sleep, I would dream that I was running away from the forest. I would run so far away from the giants that they turned into dwarfs. But as I turned around to look at the sight behind me, I would trip and fall, landing on my hands and knees. It took every strength inside of me to get up, I had to keep running. But as I got up I noticed the sight of trees around me. I was in the forest. I began to run again, harder, faster. Pushing everything inside of me. Zooming past, avoiding the trees that were in my way. But the trees were never-ending, I could never get out. Every single time I had that dream, I could never get out.
Looking at the forest now I felt a sudden change wash over me. Wyatt and I were born in this house. Born into these woods. We never truly felt scared of the forest, we were only scared because everyone else convinced us we should have been. So Sadie ran into the woods, she’s a dog, whose to say she didn’t do what most dogs do and run away? Wyatt and I have played in these woods for as long as I could remember. Our parents tried to shield us but, any opportunity given to us to get closer into the forest, we took. We even had a secret base right outside the edge of our property line. It was nothing fancy, just some heavy-duty cardboard taped together on the side of a fallen tree. It had a tiny chest stuffed with chips, some old toys, a blanket, and some bandaids with fairies on them. We would run away to our fort- “Fort White Oak” to get away from the insanity that was our parent’s. Wyatt could give me one look and I would know to meet there at lights out. It was our safe space. He had to be there. Not even taking into account how many years it’s been since his disappearance, I thought,
He knows these woods. From all the hide-and-seek games, he’s survived.
As I begin to walk further from the house I feel a slight breeze brush past my skin. My uncovered arms and legs are now covered in goosebumps. It’s chilling, but it gives me a rush. I take a step forward. And then another. And before I know it I am just arm’s length away from stepping into the forest. The same spot I last saw Sadie. The breeze picks up once more, shaking the trees that doom over me. And when the leaves danced in the wind, the forest called out with its siren, similar to the ones that I heard when I was younger. The forest suddenly became dark. The siren was growing louder turning into threatening whispers blasting in my ears. I tried to block the noise out with my hands but it was ringing inside of my head. It was making me dizzy causing me to lose my footing, taking a step into the forest. Suddenly the noises stopped. Silence settled across the forest and everything was peaceful. I turned around looking back at the house when suddenly I heard,
“Julia”
I quickly turn around looking into the woods seeing just a quick glimpse of something red. A sense of hope washes over me and I begin to take a few steps further into the forest.
And Rule #3… Look away, turn away, walk away. If you hear your name being called…no you didn’t, began echoing in my head. But I couldn’t just look away, I didn’t want to turn away and I sure as hell didn’t want to walk away.
“Julia”
I hear my name being called once more but this time to the left of me instead of in front. It sounded like a little boy, like a nine-year-old boy who walked into these woods and never walked out. That’s when I see him, what appears to be the silhouette of a little boy peering from behind a tree just a couple of feet away from me. Looking right at me. I begin to run towards my Wyatt but just as I do I see headlights through the trees. I look back at the house to see my father’s car pulling in. I see him get out and run into the house. Thinking he’s going back in there to grab more beer or money for more beer, I begin to run once more.
“Julia!” But this time, when I hear my name being called out, it is non-other than my father’s booming voice. I stop running yet again looking in the direction of the scream. I see my father running out the back door of the house looking around and calling out my name again and again. He came back for me. My father didn’t leave me, he would never leave his only daughter. Yet, he did. My mind is being twisted in all different directions.
He left me.
He came back for me.
Or did he come back for something else and noticed that I wasn’t home?
He wasn’t worried till he came back.
He left me.
With every second I wasn’t coming out, my father’s screams grew in agony.
Do I run out to him and let him know I’m okay?
Or do I take my chance on finding that red shirt? Finding Wyatt.
The image of little five-year-old me, being held tightly by my father’s burly arms. He was a horrible father, but any time I would cry he would rush to me, faster than my mother. I said he was very protective over me, and he truly was. The forest made him a bad father. He knew that so he taught Wyatt how to fight, defend, protect, and survive.
I couldn’t let my father lose the only thing left in his life, his only purpose in life. But before I could take a step in any direction, I heard it.
“Julia”
But it wasn’t my father’s voice or Wyatt’s. It was my mother’s.
I quickly turn around to see a silhouette standing six feet away from me.
The sun had completely gone down and the moon and stars began to make their appearance. The forest, silent like a mouse became dark once more. I look ahead at the figure standing in front of me. It was clearly a woman. Her silky, white, floor-length dress fit the curves of her body. She was petite but stood tall. I could see the ends of her hair that reached down to her hips. Gently curled brown locks just like my mother’s. It was my mother, but she didn’t have a face. I couldn’t see a foot in front of me the forest was so dark, but she had a slight glow, radiating from her body. She slowly reached her hand out to me. I took a step forward.
“Julia!” my father’s voice boomed in the distance.
I took another step forward. And another. His cries continued but they grew softer as I walked closer to the figure. Suddenly, I felt a slight chill gently settle on my hand. Looking down, I see holding onto me, a nine-year-old boy in a red shirt with stormtroopers on the front. He had a slight glow to him as well, but no face.
“Hi, Wyatt” I whisper. He waves and then uses all the strength his little nine-year-old self has and began pulling me closer to my mother. When I finally reach her she pulls me close to her body. I no longer hear the sounds of my father. I begin to feel warm and comforted. I feel sad, relieved, and happy. And for the first time since Wyatt has disappeared, I feel at peace. My mother loops her arm through my right arm and Wyatt still holds onto my left. We begin walking further into the forest. I turn around to look at my one-story run-down tan house with the ugly blue shutters for the last time. That life is now over. All my pain and suffering left the second I stepped foot out of that place. I no longer thought about my father, about the rules, about the danger. I only thought of one thing. My whole world finally aligned, and my future held right on my left arm.