mothman

The clouds migrated south to the ground where the freeway was void of any cars but one. A silver 1965 Chevrolet Nova cut through the thick fog on the road, enveloping the car in a hardly navigable haze. A young couple held hands on the center console, fresh shiny rings on each of their left hands. The night was cold and fuzzy on their cross-state journey. The light from the dash barely illuminated their soft smiles full of new love and life ahead of them. The young girl had sleep in her eyes. She looked out in front of her; the headlights caught every glistening water particle in the air. The only thing they could make out in the distance was the hazy highway street lights. They were like lamps, and like moths they drove in their direction.

The girl tightened her grip on her partner’s hand. “It’s strange to think we won’t live in California anymore,” she said.

“We’re going to make a life together in Idaho, dear,” the boy responded. He smiled wide and glanced at his girl, her eyebrows disappeared under her blunt bangs when she smiled. She had a gap in her front teeth and as soon as they met, he knew that was the smile he wanted to fall asleep and wake up to. “We’ve talked about it for so long and now it's finally happening.”

The girl looked out of her passenger seat window. A lingering pit in her chest dampened her smile. Each mile they drove was a mile further from home than she had ever been. Maybe it was excitement that made her restless, but it was a little too similar to fear. The year-round hot and sunny days weren’t coming with her. All she had to bring with her was a kiss on the forehead her dad gave her and belongings from her mom. She held the discomfort in her shoulders of not knowing what Idaho brings, and leaving California behind. All that was familiar was becoming a further and further drive away.

“Brennan?”

“Yes, dear?”

“Are you sure we have everything?”

“Of course, I double checked everything on the list.” He gently laid his hand on the girl’s knee, stroking the outer part with his thumb. He snuck another glance at his girl’s brown eyes and they were written in worry. “What’s wrong?”

The young woman peeled the skin off her lips with her long fingernails. “Nothing,” she paused. “You’re absolutely positive you secured the salary at your job, right? It’ll be enough?”

Brennan sighed, “Maureen, not this again. We’ve had this conversation twelve times in the past week.”

“I know,” she said slightly out of breath, “But I’m just saying that we could have stayed home with my parents until we could buy a house. My mom could help us settle into our life together and she wouldn’t charge us rent. I know things with her were rocky when I was younger, but I think she’s getting better.” She fiddled with her earring, gazing at the fog.

Brennan kept his eyes on the road where the fog created a wall. “Darling, you keep calling it home, but there’s no place for you to grow there. You know how I feel about your mom. And besides, we have to figure our life out together. We’re going to make a new home. Let’s give it some time. You know I won’t let you down, alright?”

“I just don’t want you hunting too much once we’re out there,” Maureen said flatly.

“I’ll only get one deer per session,” Brennan said in a drawn out southern accent.

“I like deer.”

She was silent for a few minutes after that. The air outside the car hummed in static. The radio was low, barely audible. Their bags in the trunk shifted and danced with each smooth turn. Brennan took Maureen’s hand and kissed the back of it. A car passed them, the first they’ve seen in several miles. It disappeared into the shroud of mist just as quickly as it appeared.

“The fog is really dense, huh?”

Maureen twisted her torso away from him, crossing her arms.

“It’s nights like there where I dream about mothman,” Brennan said teasingly.

Maureen rolled her eyes, but still smiled. “I can’t believe you actually think he’s real.” She snickered a little and looked at her boy, his face lightly illuminated by the white of the dashboard and the shadow of the night hidden in his smile.

They drove through a spot with bad connection. The radio went static on their Frank Sinatra melodies.

“See, the radio went out, he has to be real. It’s a shame he’s only been seen on the east coast. Tonight would be a perfect night to come face to face with him.”

Maureen shook her head, “I would never want to see that thing.”

“Why? Are you afraid he might eat you? Steal your soul?”

“Stop, stop, stop!” Maureen squealed and laughed a little.

Brennan looked at her, his eyes squinted with laughter. “Sorry to say, princess, but California will steal your soul a lot faster—”

“Brennan STOP!” Maureen screamed and pointed ahead, pushing herself to the back of her seat.

The car’s headlights shone on a deer. Its eyes glowed white in the refraction of the light, its antlers carried the moon in the barely parted clouds. It beckoned the young couple to hit it, begging for some sort of death on the road.

Brennan swerved off to the right against his better judgement. The deer took back its request for death and ran the rest of the way across the road. The car collided with the deer’s hind leg with a loud thump and launched it over the barriers. The road was slick and the tires couldn’t keep their grip to stop without spinning out. Brennan lost his hands in the dark and steered the car into and through the barrier, landing in the ditch that separated the road from the woods.

The car hummed on its side, the radio half chattered and half staticed softly in the dead of the night. The round halogen bulb on the right headlight was completely broken. Speckled deer fur and blood contrasted the silver paint which was also a little chipped at the impact. Brennan opened the trunk and rummaged around for the flashlight in one of their duffle bags. Maureen checked if any of their fragile items broke. A sharp pain rang through her palm. In between the cushions of their bags, a beautiful vase her mother gave her—the only item of sentimental value to her—was shattered to pieces.

“I’m going to stand near the shoulder of the road and see if anyone stops to help us,” Brennan’s voice pierced through the air. He was just a haze of a silhouette in front of the car. The air was thick and muggy. There was no telling where the horizon started or what could be lurking just around the corner.

Maureen kept her hand on the car and walked in the direction of Brennan’s voice, but only fog in the vague shape of her partner remained. “Brennan?” she whispered. She cleared her throat and said louder, “Brennan!”

“I’m right here!” His voice was far. Maureen stepped one foot in front of the other, the wet grass folding over her mary janes. Her hand left the car’s surface, a light smear of blood leaving her trace, and she was absorbed in the fog floating between the highway and the forests. She kept taking little steps forward until a mass appeared under her foot. Maureen yelped. The wet surface of a woman’s saddle shoe dug under the sole of Maureen’s foot. She kneeled to pick it up and just in front of her face was the injured deer. A consistent warm breath from the animal’s nose muttered Maureen’s face. It stood rigid, staring into her eyes, one leg lifted and bloodied. It had a red purse in its mouth with a cursive letter “L” engraved on it.

A woman’s scream came from the trees. The deer flinched and ran to safety in the woods, knocking Maureen down into the dewy grass. The scream echoed and birds flew in disturbance of the night’s peaceful rest. Maureen picked up the shoe and ran the same path of the deer, calling out, “Wait! Lead me to her!” No matter how she thought Brennan’s favorite story was just a legend from some kids on LSD in West Virginia, she didn’t want to leave the poor girl lost in the woods.

The air got wetter and thicker, it was hard to keep her eyes open. The cold winds blew right in her face and she lost all sight of the deer. The tree’s gnarled faces leered at her and the branches swept at her head to turn her hair into tangles. Beading eyes followed her every move, smelling the blood on her hand. Within every few paces there was another wet cobweb she ran into. Tension filled in her body until a large muscular mass flew above her in a flash. It made leaves fall off trees and the air around it gave way to sound at its speed. Maureen’s hands ran cold and her eyes grew wide, burning in the wind.

“Hello? Is someone there?” An owl hooted in response. Maureen’s head pounded under her headband. Her chest grew restless as the need to cough grew stronger and stronger from running in the cold of the night that grew ever colder. She lost all feeling in her nose, like it could fall off from one hefty sneeze. She started talking out loud. “I should have never left California,” she muttered, shivering in her sweater and miniskirt. Her vision became TV static as tears welled in her eyes. She tried to shake the foreboding word of fear in her head: lost. “I want my mom,” she cried.

She circled around the trunk of a big tree, the bark uneven and textured, itching to give someone a splinter. She ran her hand behind her pacing, softly touching the trunk. Her nail polish began chipping at the tips of her nails and as she walked further around the tree, her nails dug deeper into the wood until she stood there frozen.

The back of the deer faced Maureen. Its tail was low and the head bowed down. The gash of the leg was open and dirty. Blood trailed down the leg of the deer where the bone was clearly broken, bending the wrong way. Red dropped on the matching saddle shoe Maureen carried with her, attached to the woman. She wore the same miniskirt Maureen had on. Her arm laid out unmoving; fingers blue with her long dark hair tangled between them. Maureen thought she must have fallen asleep. She had to wake her up before she died of hypothermia. The deer’s head stayed low to the ground by the woman’s stomach. Maureen took a step and snapped a small twig.

The antler of the deer whipped around in a heartbeat. Its eyes were completely white, not a hint of iris or pupil to be seen, like they had rolled back into the socket. They glowed like the moon. Its muzzle was wet with redness and the purse that was hanging in its mouth was replaced by a tangle of organs throbbing and swaying from its teeth. The woman didn’t move. The clouds parted just enough for the moon to glow on her face. Her eyes had been picked out from the sockets. Besides little smudges of dirt on her clothes, she was clean, the mutilation on her carcass had been done with surgical precision. Like whatever did this to her knew exactly what it was doing.

The deer kept staring at Maureen with those glowing eyes. Her face went a sickly green and her mouth became watery. Her legs shook from beneath her. The sounds of the forests went in and out of her ears, fading from audible to inaudible. The deer carefully pivoted itself to face her head on. It inched forward slowly with a drunken-like gait.

Maureen screamed and made a run for her life. “Get me out of here!” she yelled. “Brennan! Someone! Help me!” Her vocal chords ripped to shreds. She ran in the soup of the fog going everywhere and nowhere all at once. She tripped over a root and fell into a bush of thickets. They scratched her face and ripped her pantyhose. Her body trembled out of her skin, unable to get back up. So she prayed, “Someone save me, please, I need to get out of here.”

Glowing red lights like the sun flashed before her. A dark grey, almost black figure towered above her. It looked like Brennan, but about three feet taller and broader. It levitated above the ground in front of her like it was being controlled by puppet strings. It had wings as long as a car on each side, yet they were still.

Maureen bowed her head and accepted her fate to his harbinger of death floating before her.

You’ve lost your way.

Maureen heard a deep voice from the beast. She did not see a moving mouth. Sharp teeth peeked out from the lips of the void-like appearance of the creature. She could hear it perfectly in her mind, nonetheless. Her breath started to shorten. “Who said that? Please, I just want to go home.”

Child, what is home to you?

The beast cocked its head sideways. Its wings folded up like the sky was just a blanket. Its feet reached the ground and it hunched itself smaller, its face eyelevel with Maureen. The shining redness on her face, highlighting the tears silently streaming down her face.

She held her head in her hands, curling herself up into a ball. “If you’re going to kill me, do it quickly.”

You think because I am unfamiliar I must be frightening. You think because I am frightening I must be malicious.

The creature sat with Maureen until she dared to look at the creature’s unblinking eyes again. The steady glow warmed her slightly.

I tell you, clinging onto the only life you know will kill you faster than moving on. Not all that is scary is out to hurt you.

The creature extended an arm and pointed away. Maureen turned to where it pointed.

It is time for you to go, Maureen.

She looked back and the creature was gone. The red flashes of the eyes—her only light source in the densening fog—disappeared. She stood her ground alone and the only direction she had was lost in the fingertips of the creature. Maureen took the time to tie her hair back again neatly. Sticks got caught in her bun when she fell down and they were itching into her skull.

The white eyes of the deer appeared in the distance. Maureen dropped her hair tie and ran. She ran in the direction the creature pointed. It was all trees and rocks and fog and more trees, but she ran and didn’t look back. Along the horizon beneath the fog she could see its bright red eyes blinking. She ran through her rolled ankles and burning skin and running nose and fevered thoughts lest she fall victim to the deer. The trees rushed past her and the sky opened little by little until she was out of the forest, the red lights in front of her. She ran headfirst into the arms of the large, dark, shadowy figure.

“Maureen! Where were you?” The breathless voice of her partner rang in her ears as he scooped her into his arms.

“Huh?” The hazard lights of their car flashed on and off on the road. The wings of the creature were nowhere to be seen.

“Oh dear, you’re freezing.” Brennan stroked her face where she had a few cuts. He wiped the tears from her cheek, smearing a little bit of eyeliner in the process. He cradled the back of her head in his hand and pulled her into his chest. “Are you okay?”

In a voice as quiet as the wind she said, “I just want to go home.”

“We’re a long way from California. We’re not going back to that old home.”

“No, I mean I want to go to our new home.”

Brennan took Maureen into his arms again and they shared each other’s head in the blistering cold of the night. “Let's get in the car and on the road again.”

They got in the car and once again they drove in the foggy abyss of the freeway. The heat blasted their freezing fingers. Maureen kicked off her dirty shoes and clung onto Brennan’s arm in the center console.

“Maureen?”

“Yes?”

“What made you change your mind about Idaho? I thought it wasn’t home to you yet?” Brennan kept his eyes firmly on the road and drove below the speed limit.

Maureen smiled, her face tingled in the car’s heated air. “I’m not sure you’ll believe me.”

Brennan smiled with one side of his mouth. “Hit me.”

“Well, remember how you were talking about mothman?”

The two of them smiled and giggled through the tale of Maureen’s encounter. And a levitating dark void with red eyes followed them to the safety of Idaho.