Dark Hollows. Steve Frech

checking in this afternoon. I’ve got a few hours until they arrive, and since she didn’t touch anything, the cottage is ready to go. I rip the pages out of the guestbook, and burn them in the fire pit, destroying the only tangible evidence I have of her existence.

      I need to think. I need a trip to The Sanctuary.

      Behind the cottage is a path leading into the woods. About half a mile in, over some ridges and across a stream, is a dense area of pine trees. For the life of me, I can’t figure out why it’s there. When I first came across it while scouting the property, I thought it might be a man-made pine farm that had been forgotten, but the trees aren’t in rows. It’s just a fluke, I guess.

      I reset the passcode on the key lockbox for the cottage, grab Murphy’s favorite red tennis ball, and we head off into the woods. Murphy knows the route, and darts back and forth across the path, going from smell to smell. We take this walk three or four times a week. Today, he strays a little further from the path than usual, but I don’t bother with his leash. My thoughts are too tangled.

      Birds chirp from the trees as we make our way further and further into the forest. Normally, I would be drinking it in, but I can’t. I keep going over last night in my mind—the hair, the doll, the name nearly carved into the guestbook. We arrive at the stream. There’s almost no water in it, but sure enough, Murphy finds a puddle to splash in.

      We crest the final ridge and the path slopes down to the right, leading to the opening of The Sanctuary.

      The thick, interwoven pine branches that form the opening look like the mouth of a cave. Murphy runs ahead and plunges through. I follow a few seconds behind.

      Stepping through the opening, I’m wrapped in almost total silence. The soft breeze can’t penetrate the needles overhead. The sun’s light is scattered, casting the area into an even shade. Murphy barks at a fleeing squirrel and there’s not even an echo. About fifty yards in, amongst the massive trunks, is a clearing. There’s a downed tree off to the side, like it was purposefully placed there to serve as a bench. You can sit on it and look up at the sky through the hole in the trees, like you’re staring out of a well.

      I love this place. The outside world doesn’t exist here. It was in this spot, sitting on this log, that I made the decision to buy the house and start the coffee shop. For a while, I didn’t tell my guests about it because I didn’t want to share it, but one day, a guy from Tulsa who was staying at the cottage found it, raved about it in his review, and I figured since the secret was out, I’d use it as a selling point.

      I take a seat on the log. Murphy gives up on the squirrel and runs over to me. He sits and waits.

      “What?” I ask, with an exaggerated shrug.

      Murphy’s tail begins to thump on the ground.

      “I don’t know what you want,” I say, shaking my head.

      He yaps, and lowers his head.

      “Okay, fine.”

      I take the red tennis ball out of my pocket and begin throwing it for him. He darts after it, brings it back, and we repeat the process over and over. My mind begins to drift, and I start thinking of her.

      She’s always there, in the back of my mind, the pangs of guilt, and the dreams. After so many years, I’ve buried it in the recesses of my mind, but after the events of this morning, I’m pulled back to the party where we first met—

      —at a party at a frat house at Wilton University in Rutland. It was a Christian college, but even some Christian colleges have frat houses. Our introduction happened where a lot of college introductions happen—over a keg of Bud Lite.

      The party had spilled into the yard. She was sticking close to a group of girlfriends while us guys circled like sharks, waiting for the opportunity to pick them off. The problem was that all the sharks wanted the same fish. She had light blue eyes, pale skin, high cheekbones, a strong chin, and gorgeous, flowing red hair that cascaded over her shoulders in waves. In all this perfection, there was the small scar over her right eye that added an air of mystery.

      While other guys looked for an opening, I watched her beer. Once it got low, I made my way to the almost forgotten keg in the corner of the yard.

      My strategy paid off when she came over for a refill.

      “Let me get that for you,” I said, as only a smooth twenty-four-year-old would say.

      “Thanks.” She smiled.

      “I’m Jacob. Jacob Reese.”

      “Laura Aisling.”

      “Nice to meet you, Laura Aisling. Who are you here with?”

      “Just some friends. You?”

      “Just some friends.” That was my first of what would be many lies to her.

      We made small talk and drifted over to a picnic table near the edge of the yard, away from the crowd. I tried to be clever and used pick-up lines that had been successful on countless other girls on countless other campuses. She was amused, but not taken by them. As we spoke, I began to fiddle with some sticks and long pine needles that I picked up off the ground.

      “What are you doing?” she asked.

      “You’ll see.”

      We continued talking. She was a political science major who had transferred from New Hampshire University her sophomore year.

      “Why did you transfer? Couldn’t cut it at UNH?”

      She rolled her eyes. “Yeah. Something like that.”

      “I hope you don’t mind me asking, but that scar?”

      She touched the scar with her fingers. “Childhood injury. Fell out of a tree.”

      “Really?”

      “Yeah. I wish there was a better story behind it.”

      “Well, maybe this will make it better.” I handed her the stick doll I had been working on. The sticks formed the torso, arms, and legs, while the pine needles had been tied to hold it all together.

      “For me?” she asked in mock flattery.

      “Just something I learned in Boy Scouts.”

      She saw right through my bullshit.

      “Well, I shall treasure it always,” she said, clutching it to her chest, toying with me.

      She paused, contemplated the doll, and looked at me.

      “How many girls has this little trick worked on?”

      My confidence rushed out of me like a deflating balloon. She had called me out and made me feel like an idiot, which made her all the more enticing, but I took it that the chase was over.

      “It works on most girls, but obviously, you are not most girls,” I said.

      She started laughing, which drew the attention of some of the party attendees around the yard.

      “All right, all right. I’ll take it back,” I said, holding out my hand.

      She held it closer to her chest, and twisted her torso away from me. “No, no, no. I’m keeping it.” There was that playful smile, and those eyes shone as she held the doll against her perfect breasts. She was something and she knew it.

      “Okay,” I said, my confidence returning. “What do I get?”

      “For what?”

      “For the stick doll.”

      “That’s rude,” she said, feigning insult. “He has a name.”

      “Oh, yeah? What is it?”

      She looked down at the doll and then smiled at me. “Duh. His name is ‘Woody’.”

      Man, she was good.

      “Okay. What do I get for Woody?”