We’d been driving for five hours when the clouds finally caught up with us. Low, heavy, ready-to-burst clouds that flattened the light and made the road feel older than it had any right to. We pulled into a rest stop that looked like every rest stop-big map kiosk, a couple of picnic tables sinking into the dirt, and a bathroom that had probably seen some crimes.

She unbuckled first.

“I’ll only be a minute,” she said. “Maybe grab a snack if there’s a machine?”

“Sure,” I told her, stretching until my spine made questionable noises.

As she stepped out of the car, she paused at the message board beside the bathroom. Usual clutter-lost sunglasses, firewood deliveries, church event flyers. But one poster stood out: a golden mutt with a lopsided ear. Missing. Reward offered.

She snorted. “Who names a dog Pancake?”

She shook her head, smirking at the absurdity, and kept walking.

I didn’t think anything of it.

I walked to the vending machines. Half the buttons were dead, and the only recognizable item was peanut M&Ms. I hit the button. Nothing. Hit it again. The machine wheezed like it needed an inhaler.

It was quiet. The wrong kind of quiet. No new cars rolling in. No families yelling at each other. No bathroom doors slamming. Just the trees rustling and some lone, judgmental bird making weird noises.

When I got back to the car, the passenger seat was still empty.

No big deal. Bathrooms happen. Maybe she was stretching her legs or checking out the short trail that wound behind the building.

I sat in the driver’s seat. Five minutes passed. Then eight. Then ten.

Something in me tightened.

I called her name. Nothing.

I checked the bathroom. Empty. The picnic tables. Empty. The trail entrance. Empty.

The whole rest stop looked abandoned-like someone had evacuated everyone but forgot to leave a note.

Back at the car, I noticed her phone in the cup holder, screen lit. A text message was typed but unsent. Six words:

Tell them I’m sorry about-

It cut off mid-sentence.

A chill crawled up my spine. She never left her phone behind. Ever.

I shouted her name again, louder this time. My voice bounced off the road and came back smaller.

Behind the building, the trees packed in tighter, the trail narrowing to almost nothing. I moved toward it, stomach twisting. The rest stop’s hum faded into forest silence.

“Hey!” I called. “This isn’t funny!”

A faint sound answered. Not a branch. A voice. A single warped syllable.

I stepped deeper into the trees.

My heart thudded against my ribs in that unpleasant, primal way. I walked faster. The forest swallowed sound, swallowed distance, swallowed logic. Every few seconds, I swore I heard something-but I couldn’t tell where it came from.

Then, clear enough to cut through everything:

My name.

Her voice. Tight. Strained. Not playful. Not casual. Afraid.

“Where are you?” I yelled.

Another sound-louder. A yell. A warning? A call for help? It was impossible to tell. Sound ricocheted off the trees like they were playing hot potato with her voice.

I ran.

Branches slapped my arms. The sky growled above the canopy. The trail dipped and twisted until it funneled me into a clearing-not really a clearing, more a sag in the earth. A narrow ravine split the ground, steep and slick with roots.

And from somewhere inside that ravine came her voice again:

“Down here! Please-”

The wind swallowed the rest.

I lunged forward, peering over the edge. I couldn’t see her. Just mud, ferns, shadow, and a drop deep enough to wreck a leg if you weren’t careful.

I stepped closer.

The ground shifted under my foot.

A slice of earth slid. Roots snapped. My stomach lurched as gravity tilted-

I grabbed a branch, barely keeping myself from pitching forward.

Below, she shouted again. Sharper. Urgent.

“Don’t move!”

And the woods went silent.

Continue reading (Chapter-2) » The Dog in the Ditch