The first person that I see after making it back to the car is Krista. When we make eye contact, her sky-blue eyes light up in relief. She exits the car screaming my name while running towards me. I laugh as we hug, grateful for her warmth.

"Andrew has the heat blasting in the car. Let's get you inside." Krista helps me into the backseat, running her warm hands over my cold ones, trying to help thaw them out.

"I was in such a hurry to get out of there that I forgot to put my gloves back on after doing the ritual," I say after she comments on my trembling hands. "Speaking of rituals, Satan says what up." I toss my phone to Andrew in the driver's seat, telling him to play the video I recorded. "Just kidding. Your boy doesn't exist! As I had said earlier."

Andrew watches the recording with a hard scowl on his face. "You want me to give you $200 for an audio recording when I specifically asked for video? How am I supposed to know whether you went to the right spot or not? This isn't the proof I wanted."

"What are you talking about? I literally recorded everything." I snatch my phone back and replay the video for myself.

After I walk away from the phone once getting it set up on the ground, the recording immediately goes black. The audio continues to record properly, but the video stops there.

"Shit! I did not just spend two hours out there only to end up with a corrupted file," I grumble in frustration. "Everything was working fine when—"

"Two hours?" Johnny turns to look at me. His thick brows furrow in confusion. "Mags, you haven't been gone for two hours. It's barely been thirty minutes."

"Are you feeling alright?" Krista asks, checking my face for any bumps and bruises. "You didn't trip and hit your head out there on anything did you?"

At this point, I don't even know anymore!

I close my eyes and try to calm myself down. None of what's happening right now makes any sense. How could I have been gone for thirty minutes when the time on my cell phone showed something different? Am I losing my mind, or could this be some sick joke that Andrew decided to play on me after I came back? Johnny, I would expect him to go along with something like that, but not Krista. She looks as baffled as I'm feeling right now.

"Look, the bottom line is that I went out there and did the damn ritual, so instead of being pissy about the ruined recording, just run me my money and drive us home already," I say to Andrew, not even trying to hide my attitude. "The sooner the better, please."

"A deal is a deal, bro." Johnny chuckles at his friend, taking my side. "You owe her."

Although upset about not being able to watch the footage that I recorded, Andrew doesn't put up a fight with me. He fishes out his wallet and pays me exactly $200 in the form of tens and twenties. I pocket it before cuddling up to Krista, using her body heat to help warm me up faster.

Driving away from Brinton Forest, I try not to think about how the temperature has randomly plummeted from when we left the warehouse party.

The four of us all live relatively close to each other, excluding Andrew, so he automatically saves gas by not having to drive all over town to get us home. Krista and Johnny get off before me because their houses come up first. Andrew pulls into my driveway last and parks, turning around to face me just as I reach for the door handle to leave.

"Yeah?" I stop and look at him, puzzled.

"Sorry for being such a dick earlier," Andrew says, looking genuine. "I'm ashamed to admit that I've been a bit obsessed with the lore surrounding that stupid forest. I even tried to do the ritual once but chickened out at the last minute, so did all my other friends. What you did back there, it took a lot of balls... uh, I-I mean, courage. It took a lot of courage!" He corrects himself, blushing a little. "You're not as shy and introverted as I thought you were."

"At least not until after you get to know me." I smile. This is the longest that we've ever held a conversation and I'm lowkey starting to feel awkward. I give him a quick goodbye. "Tonight was pretty wild, but I also had a lot of fun. We should all link up again sometime."

"I'd like that." Andrew smiles.

"See you around." I exit the backseat of the car and walk up to the front door of my house, ignoring all the lights being off inside. It's late, so I assume everyone is fast asleep.

After I hear Andrew pull off down the road, I fetch the spare key from underneath the flowerpot on the porch. I lost the one that I originally had ages ago. My parents never thought to get me a replacement made, and I always forget to ask. I quietly creep inside and tiptoe my way up to the second floor.

My parent's bedroom is at the end of one hall while me and my brother have the other side of the house to ourselves. I see that his door is cracked open; I nosily peer inside only to find it empty. I think nothing of it. He's eighteen, freshly graduated from high school, and it's the weekend. No doubt he's sleeping over at a friend's house or something. I walk past my bedroom to check on my parents and much to my surprise, they aren't in their rooms either.

Even though they run an emergency vet clinic that's open twenty-four hours, they always make sure that they're home in time for dinner. Before now, I don't think I've ever seen them stay out past midnight. This behavior is highly unusual for them. I start to worry that maybe something bad happened to them while on their way home from work. I pull my cell phone out to try and call them, but it's dead. I don't know how when last I checked, I had almost sixty percent battery life.

"Why does it feel like I've entered The Twilight Zone?" I whisper to myself, shaking my head to clear it of all negative thoughts. I walk back to my bedroom and open the door. It always takes me a few seconds to find the light switch on the wall, but eventually, I do. I flick it upward and light swiftly floods the room, allowing me to zero in on the tall stranger standing near my bed. "Y-You again..." I stammer in shock.

The man stares directly at me with his eerily realistic black eyes, and then he gives me a look that screams disappointment. I'm too scared to move to pick up my cell phone that I just dropped. I can't turn around to make a run for it because my legs have locked up again. I can do nothing but stand frozen in place, silently praying for the first time in a long time.

I pray that I make it out of this nightmare alive.