Chapter 26

CHAPTER 26

The rest of the day is uneventful as the storm continues to roll in. I'm too embarrassed to face my friends, so I go back to Kincaid's boat with him. My brain keeps on wanting to think about Clayton, to talk about Clayton. I want to talk about the animals in the woods. I want to know if Madrona picked me for a purpose. All of the questions are on the tip of my tongue, threatening to spill, but I decide to deal with it the way I've been dealing with everything else. I put it in a box, put a bow on it, and shove it in the back of my head. Once I'm out of here, once I'm free from this goddamn fog and this fucking lodge, then I'll take all the boxes out and face them. Unwrap the bows and deal with them head-on.

But for now, in order to survive these next few days, I have to focus on the present. If I start opening those boxes now, I will crumble and be of no use to anyone.

Kincaid takes care of me, which makes it easier to concentrate on him. He cooks for me, we have sex, and then I play the role of shrink.

I make him talk.

"Where were you born?" I ask him as we lie beside each other in bed. Above us, rain pelts the hatches, the sound soothing. The only sunshine of the entire day slanted down on us a couple hours ago, a peculiar, deep yellow light from a break in the storms, but the showers have picked up again.

He picks up my wrist and kisses the underside where the belt cut into me earlier when he had me tied up on the floor.

"Vancouver," he says. "The real one, not the fake one in Washington."

"What year?"

He pauses. "Are you going to judge me for being old?"

I laugh. "No. I like older men."

"Fair enough. I was born in 1985."

"So you're thirty-seven."

"Yes." He hesitates. "Does that count as old?"

"Sure does," I say playfully. "At least you're not forty."

"Heaven forbid," he says, hand at his chest in a dramatic fashion.

"And where were your parents from?"

"Scotland," he says. "Aberdeen. When I was younger, I had a Scottish accent because they taught me how to talk. I went to kindergarten sounding like Mike Meyers in So I Married An Axe Murderer. You know, ‘Head! Move! Now!'" He says this in a pitch-perfect brogue, even though I have no idea what movie he's talking about.

"Bah," he says, giving my shoulder a tap. "I forgot that you youngins don't know what good movies are."

"Sounds like I'll have to watch it," I say. "As soon as we get out of here, unless you're allowed to break the rules and show me a movie right now. Is the satellite still running? Maybe we can pull it up on Netflix." I look at him with puppy dog eyes, dying for a distraction. "I'll beg."

He growls at me. "You know I can't say no to you begging, sweetheart." Then he gets up. "Alright. Stay here. We'll watch it."

"Are you for real?"

"I am for real, Syd," he says with a grin as he disappears into the boat.

My stomach flutters with excitement, at the fact I'm going to actually watch a movie after I've been deprived of media for so long, but then my heart starts to flutter too. Like there are butterflies unleashed in my chest.

I'm not in love with Kincaid, despite what the butterflies are trying to tell me, but he must be feeling something if he's willing to do all of this for me. And I don't just mean showing me a forbidden Mike Meyers' movie. I mean willing to quit his job to make sure that I get out of here, that I'll have a life to return to. I know Everly was being sarcastic, but perhaps this could be the start of a precious love story.

Or maybe I need to rein it in and take this one day at a time.

He comes back with his iPad. I can't help but relish the view, considering he's buck naked too. "Alright, everything is working, and it's on Netflix, all lined up to go."

He climbs into bed with me, places the iPad against a pillow, and presses Play.

I squeal with delight as the TriStar Pictures logo comes up.

"Thank you," I whisper to him.

He leans over and places a kiss on my cheek. "You deserve it. Something to take your mind off things. You've been through so much, Syd. And I am so proud of you for how you've been handling it."

Wrapping it up in a box and shoving it aside , I think, and turn my attention back to the movie. And I can keep doing it for a few more days.

Just a few more days.

Morning rolls around with a bang.

At around 6:00 a.m., the bed started shaking, the bumpers squeaking relentlessly against the dock as the boat was lifted up and down out of the water by the swells. Neither of us could sleep after that, so we got up, and Kincaid went outside to add more lines to secure the boat to the dock.

"It's probably best you go back to the lodge," he says as we drink our coffee, rain lashing the boat. "There will be nothing but squalls all day. It won't be very pleasant to be down here."

I sigh. I'm still feeling embarrassed about the other night, even though I know what I saw, even though it was Everly who drugged me and tried to take me somewhere, Everly who made me look like a crazy liar.

"I talked to your friends yesterday when you were having a nap," he assures me. "They asked about you. They're all worried about you. You matter to them, Syd."

"Fine," I say, finishing the dregs of the coffee. "I just wish I could tell them I saw a movie last night." It turns out, at about the point where Mike Meyers starts doing his slam poetry about Harriet, that I remembered I had seen the movie before. It still was enjoyable though. And to see Kincaid laugh, like hunched over, full-on belly laughs, was completely new to me.

I think that brought me one step closer to falling in love with him.

"You can tell them, but only if you feel the need to make them hate you with jealousy," he jokes.

He's probably right.

After breakfast, Kincaid walks me up to the lodge, and I'm absolutely soaked by the time I get there. He leaves me, tells me to come find him at his office or the boat later, and it takes a lot of courage to step inside the common room.

But the moment I do so, everyone who was sitting there comes running toward me. It's not even Lauren and Munawar and the usual gang; it's Christina and Toshio and Albert, people I don't normally talk to.

"We were so worried about you."

"We thought you were sent home."

"Gosh, that was so scary."

"I thought I would never see you again."

"Did you ever find out what happened to Clayton?"

I do my best to explain what I can, leaving out the part where Michael and Everly wanted my brain examined. I tell them I'm adamant that I saw Clayton in the trees though, that it wasn't some cougar.

"So the place got locked down because Clayton escaped?" Munawar asks.

Good question. "I have no idea. Maybe there was a cougar. Maybe Clayton took the opportunity to run."

"So where do you think he's being kept?" Lauren asks. "Do we need to, you know, stage an intervention?"

I think about the shadowy figures running around with guns. I think about Kincaid's warnings about how dangerous Madrona is. I think about lawsuits that would ruin every single one of us.

I shake my head. "I don't know. I don't know enough. Kincaid is bound by NDAs. He can't talk about what's happening."

"But did he confirm it was Clayton that you saw?" she asks warily. "That he's still here?"

I mull that over. Did he?

"He said he wasn't sure if Clayton was still alive," I say slowly. "He confirmed he didn't kill him."

"Well, that's helpful."

"But no, he didn't exactly say he was still here. I know what I saw though. I know it was him."

Now, I'm starting to see skepticism in some of their faces, even Lauren's.

Oh fuck, they don't believe me, do they?

"Maybe something did happen to Clayton, but they aren't allowed to talk about it," Christina suggests. "Doesn't mean he's still here."

"You know who really wouldn't believe you about all of this?" Patrick says with a laugh. "Clayton."

A few people laugh along with him, but I don't. Because this was exactly the thing Clayton kept talking about. It was what he was trying to warn me about.

"Well, I'm glad to see that you're okay," Lauren says, nudging me with her shoulder as everyone else goes back to their spots by the fire, already bored with me. "You really had me worried."

"Kincaid told me he came by and talked to you all, told you where I was."

Her smile tightens. "Doesn't mean I didn't worry. I still meant what I said. He's taking advantage of you."

Anger burns through me, swift as a forest fire. "Why are you being so negative? You always joked about us getting together."

"It was always a joke, Sydney. He's in a position of power. He's your damn psychologist." She lowers her voice, looking around. "You're his patient. And you're having mental health issues, we all know that. He knows exactly how your brain works, how to wield it, how to manipulate it. It's a systematic abuse of power, and it's gross."

I don't even know what to say to that because most of what she said is correct. But he's not using me. I know he's not.

I just grumble and push past her, going to my room to get out of my wet clothes.

I close the door and get changed into my red sweater and jeans, then sit down on the bed and try to do a few breathing exercises. Now that I'm away from the boat and Kincaid, away from Everly, away from the classes, which have been canceled because of the storm, I can finally think.

And when I think, I feel the need to take out those boxes I've shoved in the back of my head.

No , I think as I mentally reach for them. Stay focused on the now.

But because Kincaid isn't in front of me, forcing my attention on him, I can't.

I start pulling them out and unwrapping them.

The first box is one so recently wrapped, given to me by Lauren just moments ago.

Is Kincaid manipulating me somehow? With his deep knowledge of who I am and my lack of knowing who he is, is he able to make it so that he gets what he wants while having it seem like it's my idea? He's already established he's a liar. Is he a gaslighter, too?

He had blood on his shoes , I think, another box unraveling. He had blood on his shoes. Whose blood was that? Clayton's? Did he shoot him out of the tree? He is someone who knows how to use a rifle. We're in Canada; it's not a common skill here.

What are they doing to Clayton? His chest looked cut open. His face was full of blood. Did they cut his head open too? Michael had said they wanted to take a look at my brain, see what my "problem" is. See if we can fix her , he said. But Kincaid insisted that they would just attach electrodes. What if that wasn't it? What if Kincaid knew that?

Another box opened.

Then another one.

What if Madrona brought me here because they knew I had nothing? Then, as a fail-safe, they decided I needed to lose my scholarship. That's what had been bugging me earlier, on the tip of my tongue. What if they're the ones who called the dean, told some lies, took my scholarship away? I shouldn't have lost it because of a viral video that I was clearly set up for.

Oh my god, what if they went as far as to tell Professor Edwards' daughter, putting it all in motion?

I press my hands against the sides of my head, my brain feeling like it's about to explode. It's too much. I try to stay away from conspiracy theories, but everything here feels like a conspiracy.

And the boxes won't stop unraveling. Monsters spill out of them in the form of rotting wolves and bears and squealing baby goats, mycelia holding me down in the forest, the native who thought I was Everly, the unearthed grave, Amani twirling in the snow, a dead girl in the shower, the whispering trees who tell me I'm home.

No. This isn't my home. This will never be my home.

I get up. I can't stay here. I know what Kincaid said, but I can't trust him. Not until he gets me on that plane and breaks all of his NDAs.

And I'm not the type who can just sit around and wait and put all of the control in someone else's hands.

What if Kincaid never emailed the airlines?

Don't even think that , I tell myself, but I can't help it.

The lodge feels like it's looking inward right now, watching as I fight for agency.

And it doesn't like it.

I grab my raincoat and put it on, taking a half-full water bottle and slipping it in my pocket, along with my wallet and passport, then run down the stairs.

"Where are you going?" Munawar asks, but he doesn't follow.

No one follows.

I slip out the door and start walking up the path. The wind is strong, but the rain has stopped for now, and my pace is quick. I go past the lab and the north dorm until I hit the logging road, and then I start walking east. I keep my head down against the wind, trying not to get distracted by the forest. I can feel the pull of it, the trees swaying in the gusts, whispering my name, but I keep focused on keeping one foot in front of the other.

That's how you escape. That's how you get anywhere, one foot in front of the other.

I don't really have much of a plan, but it's better than sitting in my room and waiting for Kincaid to make things happen. I know that eventually, there will be a fork in the road. If I take the road to the right, it will lead to the peninsula and those…bears.

If I take the road to the left though, the one that snakes up the mountainside, it will take me to camp nine. The closest neighbors only sixteen kilometers up the road, however long that is. Is a logging camp really going to be of much help? Maybe. Maybe there's reception there and they have phones. Maybe they have a truck that can handle the roads and take me to Campbell River. I have a credit card that has just enough on it to get me somewhere. Maybe they'll be a better help than anyone at Madrona Lodge, Kincaid included.

God, I want to trust him. I want to with all my heart. But no matter what, he knows things that I don't, and until we are equal and even, no secrets, then I'm going to have to keep him at a distance.

And if you get out of here tonight? If the loggers are of help?

Then I'll email Kincaid and let him know I couldn't wait. If he cares about me like he says he does, he'll understand. Perhaps he'll still help me. If he doesn't though, I'll figure it out. I always do.

Buoyed by this new sense of control and, dare I say, hope, I start walking faster. The wind isn't as strong as it is on the water, but even so, the gusts push me along from time to time, as if the weather wants me to hurry too.

I round the corner, looking up at the magnificent lone maple amidst the cedar and hemlock, its leaves bright green and full, waving in the breeze.

I pause slightly, something about the look of the tree that's troubling me.

That's when I hear it.

At first, I think it's just the wind, making strange noises through the trees.

Then I realize it sounds familiar.

A roar. A rumble.

An engine.

My heart sinks as I turn around to see an ATV racing toward me. I expect to see Kincaid behind the wheel, and if it's him, I hope I can convince him to drive me to the camp.

But as it gets closer, I realize it's not Kincaid.

In fact, it's someone I've never seen before.

An older man with a thin face, thick bushy brows, long grey hair, and strange, piercing eyes.

And that's when I remember I have seen him before.

He was on the seaplane with me, sitting at the back with the other new staff member at Madrona.

What the hell?!

"Where do you think you're going?" the man says to me, his voice low, his hand resting on the wheel as his eyes bore into me.

"Uh, for a walk," I say.

"You're not allowed to leave," he says, the wind whipping back his straggly hair. "We can't let you leave."

Oh fuck.

"You're going to have to come with me," he says, starting to get out of the vehicle.

Hell no!

I start running.

I sprint down the logging road until I hear the start of the engine, and then I quickly veer to the right and run into the forest, wondering if I can lose him for long enough that I'll find the road again. I crash through the bushes, blackberries ripping at my leggings, reminding me of being a child, pushing myself off the trunks of spruce and pine.

I run through thickets of sword ferns that tangle at my feet, through pockets of aspen groves, until I finally come to a stop, leaning over with my hands on my thighs, spitting on the ground and trying to catch my runaway breath.

"Okay," I wheeze. "Okay."

I glance up, looking around. I'm surrounded by cedar, the undergrowth primarily salal in patches, though most of the ground is bare, covered in needles. Blue stain fungi show up on the trunks of some of the trees; on dead ones, oyster mushrooms abound.

I spit again and stare at the ground, straining my ears for sounds of the ATV or that man running in the forest after me. I don't hear anything but the wind howling.

I try to think about what to do next, where to go, when something on the ground steals my focus.

The blob of spit that just came out of my mouth…

…it's moving .

I lean in closer to get a better look, frowning.

Did I spit on an ant or something?

But I don't see any insects.

Except a worm.

Except worms .

Tiny, thin white worms are wriggling in my spit.

"Ew," I say, looking around at the soil. But there are no other worms around.

No.

No.

I put my hand to my mouth and hastily wipe at it.

When I take it away, thin worms wriggle against my wet fingers.

"Oh my god," I cry out, stumbling backward until I hit a tree. I open my mouth and start retching, dry heaving violently, until I'm able to vomit up the bacon and eggs from this morning.

And in the pile of vomit is a mass of them.

White, thin, wriggling.

And with increasing terror, I realize they aren't worms at all.

They're mycelia.

"Oh god!" I say again, trying once more to vomit, my face straining. When nothing happens, I dig my fingers into my mouth, finding them pouring out of my throat, writhing on my tongue. Screaming, frantic, choking, I pull the strands out of my throat, over and over again, throwing them on the ground in sloppy heaps. Tears stream down my cheeks at the horror of it all.

Finally, it seems like there's none left, and I don't know what to do. What does this mean? How did this happen?

A branch breaks behind me.

I whirl around to see something brown slinking through the trees.

Oh god, no. How are things getting worse?

The creature comes closer.

Brown fur.

White bones.

A cougar.

Half-dead and coming for me with slow, deliberate movements.

I scream, but it dies in my throat, already so raw from everything. I push back against the tree and stare at it in horror.

Maybe I was wrong about Clayton. Maybe I hallucinated him like I did with Amani. Maybe there really was a cougar on the loose. This very one.

And yet, this cougar doesn't look like it can do anyone harm. The way it's looking at me—two glassy white eyes, a panting black tongue—doesn't seem like it's about to attack. Like the other animals, I can see mycelia wrapped around muscle and the bones underneath, but it's mainly intact, though its patchy fur sloughs off with each step.

It stops right in front of me, staring at me with a blank look that I feel deep in my marrow.

Friend , it thinks, or something like that word.

It thinks I'm a friend.

I reach out, trying to touch it, my actions not controlled by me at all but something else. The very thing controlling the whole forest.

I press my fingers against the velvety bridge of its nose and watch in horror as mycelia reach out from beneath its eyes, pushing them out until the eyes fall from the cat's sockets and land on the ground with a plunk.

I nearly vomit again, my stomach churning, until I'm distracted by the same filaments that are now coming out from underneath my fingernails—underneath my fingernails!—reaching and snaking forward until it connects with the ones from the big cat.

And becomes one.

For a second, we are joined.

I see myself through the cougar's eyes as it stares up at me right now. I look exhausted, frightened, vomit staining my jacket.

Then, the forest shifts, and I'm in an operating lab.

On a table with bright lights above me.

"The cat should be asleep soon," a woman's voice says, and then Everly and Michael appear in my vision, wearing scrubs, masks, and goggles as they stare down at me.

The whir of a saw vibrates louder and louder.

Terror fills my veins like an IV drip.

And suddenly, I'm pulled out of the bright room. I'm back in the storm, in the trees. I'm on my knees, crying on the forest floor. Tears spill to the ground, and I'm so afraid, so fucking afraid of what's happening that I collapse onto my side, curling into a ball.

The cougar nudges my leg with its snout, a purring sound, then pads off into the woods until it disappears.

Leaving me all alone.

As if it was never here.

But I'm here.