The painting had changed. The brushstrokes had morphed into something new, as if someone had come in and altered it in the night.

No longer stood a proud deer at the lake’s edge, instead stumbled a dying animal, collapsed to the ground with blood dripping from a dozen wounds, flayed flesh hanging rotten and black from the off-white sheen of bone beneath. The lake gleamed a sickly yellow and the forest shrouded the painting in a dark shadow, the trees bare and dead, the branches grasping for the darkened sky with long claws, grazing the approaching storm clouds.

The rest of the hallway remained the same, the photos showing the same faces, the same figure, nothing any different. I wondered if a photo of my face would join the others on the walls when the week was over.

I lit the hob, placing a heavily scratched frying pan on the flame and dripping a few streaks of oil into it, waiting for it to heat up before cracking open a couple of eggs. I listened to the crackling and popping of the eggs as they fried, turning away to slot a slice of bread into the toaster. I hadn’t really been eating since I arrived after the whole fiasco of the rotten meat and the fact that...figure was still watching me from the treeline. I lifted my cup of coffee up in a mock salute at the ghoulish silhouette and it twitched as if wires had yanked at its twisted limbs.

I glanced away, unease creeping up my spine, and flipped the fried eggs onto the slice of toast, balancing it on my fingers and taking a bite.

My phone rang and I picked it up. “Adrian,” I greeted. “Have you reconsidered picking me up?”

A laugh, as if this was all just a hilarious bout of paranoia and stress. “No, just wanted to check up on you. See if any mass murderers have killed you yet.”

I eyed the figure at the edge of the clearing. “It's clearly thinking about it.”

Adrian paused, a sigh breathing through the phone line on a layer of static. “Okay, you’re just making it worse. Take a walk, enjoy your break. Go to that lake, maybe take a picnic with you. I don’t know, just stop winding yourself up. This whole thing was meant to relax you so you could return to work refreshed. Not...whatever this is.”

“This isn’t campers pranking me, Adrian,” I told him, taking another bite of my breakfast and speaking around my food. “This is real and it's messed up.”

“If you really believed that, you’d be more worried.”

I scoffed. “I am worried. I’m terrified.”

“No, Charlie.” Adrian’s voice deepened, growing husky, growling each syllable. “No, Charlie, you’re not.” That wasn’t Adrian. The voice laughed like chalk screeching on a blackboard, long and harsh. “I know everything about you, Charlie. Come outside and we’ll have a little talk.”

“I think I’ll stay inside, thanks.”

“Being cooped up isn’t helping,” the real Adrian scolded. “Just go and enjoy the park!”

We finished the call and I pocketed my phone, brushing crumbs off my fingers on my jeans. The figure walked closer, a steady approach, each step a jerking stumble as if they had little control over their limbs, each movement led by invisible tugging wires.

I double-checked that the sliding doors were locked and snatched up the knife, clinging onto it with a tight grip. Tall and thin, moving brokenly, the figure reached the back porch. It wore a hood, pale skin visible beneath a dusty brown cloak with torn sleeves, the threads of material abruptly ending halfway down its skinny thighs in shreds of fabric.

I could hear its breathing, throaty and throttling as if each exhale vibrated through mucus caught in its chest. Long, curled nails reached out, stretching towards me behind the safety of the glass, but I couldn’t see the expression the figure made as the breathing halted into that screeching, horrible laugh.

“Charlie…” it whispered, as if speaking directly into my ear. “Open the door.”

I shook my head, words trapped as I swallowed down the fear racing through my bloodstream.

The long, ghoulish hands tensed, slowly closing into an angry fist. “Then I shall.”

A loud shatter made me flinch and cry out, throwing myself back into the kitchen counter and covering my face as a hundred shards of glass rained down on me, cutting into my skin with a thousand sharp edges. My hands shook as I lowered them, blood welling up from the tiny slices, my arms and cheeks burning with numerous more, and looked out the sliding door. A breeze swept in from the forest, brushing against me with a chilling touch, and my shoes crunched on the broken glass as I stepped out of the empty frame of the door.

The figure was gone, and it had ensured no lock would bar its entry into the lodge now.