Painting Flowers (You Don't Scare Me Book 2)

Chapter One - Distance

     I felt like I'd been walking for days. Well, no, not literally. It was probably only an hour or two, but it felt like a long time. Once I got into the woods, I kept walking and I didn't look behind me for any sign of Asher. I would walk through the fallen leaves, break some sticks, maneuver around trees, but I couldn't get the feeling off of me that I was being watched. It was getting annoying, really. By then my mind was starting to play tricks on me, cursing me that there was something behind a tree or even in the branches. But of course I was just being delusional, and I moved on without looking again. If I let tiny things like that distract me, I may as well go crawling back to Asher and beg for forgiveness. Of course I was hard-headed and stubborn, that wouldn't happen in a million years. A million years being literal.

     That's when I started hearing whispers. The wind grew strong and it felt like those very whispers were being carried on the breeze, whistling past my ears. At first the whispers weren't that easy to make out what they'd been saying, but as I kept walking they only got louder. Louder, more annoying, and creepy. It seemed to be calling my name, 'Jaxon, Jaxon' repeating it over and over again. I was really thinking that I was starting to lose my mind, maybe I should go back to Asher after all. To that thought, I shook my head. Never, never would I go back to that hell hole of a home. Even though it was creepy as hell, callin' my name and shit, I was stupid and I kept walking towards it.

     I came to a stop when in my view was a house. It was raggedy, dark, and definitely uninviting. There was no life around it, all the plants were grey and dead. The house itself was painted grey, and the paint looked like it was peeling. The stairs looked broken, the windows were missing glass, and it just looked like a rotting abandoned home. Although, the house almost looked familiar to me. And for a moment, I could have sworn there was a shadowy figure in the window. I never knew there was a house back out here, I never would've thought there would be one anyway. Who ever wanted to live in the middle of a forest without any life around them at all? Probably someone extremely antisocial and hated life. Wow, that almost sounded like me.

     I mentioned the house was completely uninviting, and that definitely applied to me. I was going to avoid it at all costs, but it was like an invisible hand was holding onto my wrist and pulling me closer in. Shaking off the feeling, I gave the house one last look before turning away. Nope, was not going there, it had bad written all over it. As I turned and started walking away, I heard rustling of leaves. Immediately, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Oh shit, not good at all. I reached into my pocket, fumbling around in there. Lint, a paperclip or two, some coins, and then my pocket knife. I whipped the knife out, but say hello to butterfingers. The knife slipped and landed into a pile of leaves on the ground. I bent over, throwing the leaves away in a frantic rush to grab my knife for self-defense. It would've been embarrassing to die there with a knife right next to me, right?

     Once I found it, I secured my grip to make sure that wouldn't happen again. I stood up straight and out of no where, I was slammed into the tree behind me. My head hit hard, and I swore my brain had bounced off of every side of my skull. Groaning, I rubbed the back of my head. I looked around, but the hit was so hard that my vision had gone blurry. I could just make out a figure in front of me, somewhat shorter than me with a feminine figure.

     "Get away from me!" I yelled, holding up the knife with a wobbly hand. My vision was slowly coming back into focus, and with seconds going by I was starting to make out the person. By the time I could completely see their face, there was a knife to my neck and a girl in my face. Locks of dirty, red hair strung wildly about. Her bloodshot eyes glowed with anger. Her clothes were tattered and her skin was pale besides the blood that was on her hands. It wasn't mine, and it wasn't hers.

     As she opened her mouth, I noticed that her teeth had been sharpened to points like a shark. Her voice was crackled and two-toned as if two people were talking, one in a high and one in a low voice.

     "You were never supposed to come here, Jaxon."