The car swayed back and forth as they drove down the gravel road into Piney Hollow Campground. Cars in front kicked dust into the air, giving the surrounding trees and plants a yellowish tint on all the leaves as well as the small log-cabin trailers that are parked off to the side. Kristen always enjoyed the log cabins they had at the campground, even though they’re not the most spacious things on earth. The insides usually have a very cozy feel to them that reminded her of her childhood, when her parents used to take her and her best-friend.
“It’s been forever since I’ve stayed at one of these places!” She said turning to her boyfriend Mason.
“I know right, my parents took me and my brother and some of my friends back when I was a kid.” He smiled. “This one time we bought these fart bombs, and my mom’s friend brought her nephews with them but they were a lot older than us. “ He paused looking to see the road sign coming up. “And we decided to prank them and threw a Fart bomb in their tent!” He laughed. “Oh my god they screamed to loud when it went off, it smelled so bad.”
Kristen smiled, she loved hearing Mason’s ridiculous stories about pranks he pulled on people as a kid. The two of them had started dating about six months ago, and so far everything seemed pretty good. Kristen loved how Mason always tried to make himself look good whenever they went out, never getting too comfortable yet, and she also loved that he kept himself in shape. He wasn’t perfect (he would sometimes skip leg day and his abs) but in comparison to most guys she knew he had a pretty solid body in her opinion. He had short light brown hair and brown eyes and stood about 5’10, fairly average in comparison to some of her friends.
“Oh hey is this it?” She asked as they approached the road.
He nodded as he began to turn the car right onto the dirt road. “Where’s this bitch at?” Mason said squinting his eyes, looking for Andrea around one of the cabins.
“Please don’t say that word.” Kristen said in a low voice.
Mason forgot she hated swearing, her parents raised her in an extremely religious house (her father and mother wouldn’t allow her to celebrate Halloween for it was the devils holiday), not something he himself was used to.
“I’m sorry.” He said looking into her blue eyes and she pulled her long wavy black hair out of the knot she had it tied in.
“Its fine, I know you’re trying.” She smiled as she pulled the mirror down from the ceiling and ran her fingers through her hair and cleared something out of her eyes.
Andrea stood on the balcony, waiting for Mason’s white SUV to pull up next to the cabin. She stared at her thumb closely picking at a cuticle as their SUV finally pulled up. She smiled and waved as, the car pulled in slowly to a halt and Kristen opened the car door and stepped out.
“Hey man, what’s up!” Andrea said giving Kristen a hug and hitting her chin with her shoulder. “Sorry. I didn’t mean that. Sorry.” She said with a smile as she bobbling her head in a back and forth motion
Andrea didn’t quite have turrets but Kristen wouldn’t know how else to explain her if someone were to ask. The poor girl constantly said sorry over almost nothing all the time and she always looked frantic and all over the place, nevertheless she was a sweet heart a good friend and a great person.
“Andrea stop saying sorry. From now on just start saying go fuck yourself.” Mason laughed.
“Fuck you Mason.” She said putting her hands on her hips and nodding her head.
Mason walked to the back of the SUV and opened the trunk. “Kris mind helping me real quick?”
“I thought you went to the gym now and you’re all big n’ buff? Kristen smiled. “I have to grab my own bags?”
“Yea seriously what happened?” Andrea added giving Kristen a high five and making a nice like thwap sound.
Mason smiled and grabbed her bag and “accidentally” dropped it on the dusty ground. “Oops it fell out, maybe if you were here to help that wouldn’t have happened.” He grinned.
“You dick!” Kristen said as she went over to pick her bag up and smacking him in the back of his head.
“Well hey everyone else is down by the lake so if you guys want to hurry up we might get there before sunset.” Andrea said as they both grabbed their duffle bags.
“Don’t be so rude we just got here.” Mason joked.
“Sorry man. Sorry.” Andrea said blinking and nodding her head.
“Stop being sorry I’m just kidding.”
“Okay. Sorry, sorry.”
Mason ignored it, knowing if he kept saying anything just more apologies would just come out of her mouth, it wasn’t worth the aggravation of fighting a tic. As they walked into the cabin which, for Mason, the smell of childhood hit him directly in the face. Brining back memories of sleeping on the second story area of the small cabin with his brother and friends.
“So where are we sleeping?” He asked.
“Well…” Andrea said. “Me and Mack have the couch pullout bed, Princess Brittany and Dave have the bedroom of course, and do you guys mind sleeping up top?”
“Hell no I don’t mind at all!” Mason said overly excited.
“Whatever not a problem.” Kristen smiled.
“Sweet, yea sorry. We all kind of decided earlier and you guys weren’t here so, sorry. Sorry.”
“Anyone ever tell you that you apologize too much.” Mason joked.
“Fuck you Mason…. Sorry.”
The sun scorched the sandy road as the three of them began to walk towards the lake and meet up with the rest of the group. The sand was so hot from the sun that if someone wasn’t wearing sandals or sneakers while walking their feet may get burnt from the heat. Children ran along the path, some not looking both ways as every once in a while a car would beep its horn and the driver would yell at a kid.
“So what have you guys been up to?” Asked Andrea.
“Not much, just working for me and yelling at this one for getting scammed.” He said nodding his head at Kristen.
“Hey! I told you not to say anything!” Kristen said angrily.
“Well maybe next time you’ll listen to me.” Mason said rolling his eyes.
“Ut-oh, what happened?”
“She got a call from people claiming to help with her college bill and then saying they needed money and she decided to give away $1,200. She gave away $700 at first then called me and told me they were asking for more. I told her not to, and she didn’t listen and then that’s basically it, she got screwed.”
“I didn’t know!” Kristen whined. “It was my own money I don’t understand why you keep bringing it up. I’m already mad enough about it.”
“Because maybe next time you might listen to me instead of just paying random people over the phone and saying you’ll do what you want. It was like a slap across my face.”
Andrea could hear the tone in Mason’s voice begin to get aggravated. “Hey!” She intervened. “Let’s just drop it and have a good day today, no need for money issues here.”
“True, sorry.” Mason said as they neared the lake.
Kristen stayed quite as her blood boiled, wanting to backhand him after he promised not to say anything about it to anyone.
“Alright look for a blue umbrella with yellow ducks on it.” Andrea said as they stood at the edge of the lake’s beach.
The three of them scanned the beach looking, not seeing anything resembling what she was talking about for a minute.
“Got it.” Andrea said as they began to walk towards the right, weaving in and out of people’s legs that were tanning and children flying kites. As they neared the umbrella Mason noticed something.
“That’s a green umbrella not blue by the way.”
“Whatever, close-enough.” Andrea laughed.
Brittany was sitting in the center of the group with a glass bottle of Smirnoff ice, immediately Kristen could feel her eye’s staring through her as the approached.
“What’s-up!” Mason said as Kristen waved her hand in a rainbow motion and smiled. Mason leaned in to shake Dave’s hand and turned to shake Mack’s.
“Anyone want a beer?” Dave asked reaching behind him and opening the cooler as Mason and Kristen sat down next to each other in the empty beach chairs’
“Yeah sure.” Mason said reaching across and grabbing two bud light limes from Dave’s hands.
As Mason leaned back he noticed something off about Mack, his face seemed tight or something, almost as if he had gotten plastic surgery. Everyone in the circle began to get awkwardly quiet as they noticed Mason’s dead stare and began to look at Mack themselves.
“Why do you look so….. Weird?” Mason asked squinting his eyes.
Andrea spurted out an uncontrollable laugh that sounded like a mixing of a clown beeping a horn and a person gasping for air.
“Yea seriously.” Brittany said ignoring Andrea’s ridiculous laugh. “I’ve been thinking the same exact thing since we got here.”
Mack took his Philadelphia Eagles hat off and huffed. “The hair-dresser shaved off my God-Damn eye brows.”
“Stop It!” Mason said letting out a huge laugh along with everyone else.
“What!” Kristen exclaimed. “Why?”
“He fuckin asked if I wanted my eye brows trimmed, so I said yea. I don’t know what happened he just took the clippers against the grain and fuckin went right across.”
The entire group of them, aside from Mack himself were hysterical laughing. Once he told them you could notice it exactly from his dark olive skin color and jet black Italian hair.
“Fuck you guys.” Mack said as he put his hat back on.
“I couldn’t get him to leave the house for the past three days.” Andrea said as her clown horn laugh began to sizzle down.
“What did you say to him?” Dave asked wiping tears from his eyes.
“I lost it, it was this fuckin gay-ass black dude, and the second he did it I was like what! What the fuck-. Why the fuck did you just do that! And he just started apologizing and asked what he should do. I told him just shave the other one off and I ripped off the apron thing and stormed out. He’s lucky I didn’t punch him in the face.”
They all began laughing harder, the scenario was almost too good to be true, but it also made for the funniest thing they had ever heard.
“Okay, whew…” Brittany said holding her stomach from the abdominal cramps of laughing too hard.
“That’s gold.” Mason laughed.
“Yeah, whatever.” He said shaking his head with a smile of embarrassment. “Can we just change this conversation please?”
“Yeah man.” Mason giggled. “But you have to admit, that’s funny.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” He said.
Suddenly Kristen’s alarm on her watch began to beep.
“Shit!” She said.
“What? What’s that?” He asked looking down at her silver watch on her wrist.
“Birth control, I left it back at the cabin in my purse.” She said resetting the alarm for an hour by accident. “I have to run back.”
“Want me to come with you?” Mason asked as she stood up off the beach chair?
“No, I’ll be fine. It’s not like it’s a far walk or anything.” She wanted a little time away from him anyway, his remark about her getting scammed annoyed her. She felt stupid enough, but he kept talking about it to other people which made her feel even dumber.
“Okay, just call me if you can’t find us.” He said.
“Will do.” She said as she walked away from their small group.
Brittany waited for her to get far enough away and turned to Mason. ”How’s it goin with the young-in.” She smirked.
“Fuck off Britt, just because you don’t like her doesn’t make her a bad person. Isn’t your brother here by the way?”
She let out a small laugh. ”I don’t not like her I just think she’s too young and I don’t know, Aiden is around here bitching at his girlfriend over the phone somewhere. That’s a girl that I definitely don’t like.”
“Let’s face it, you don’t like any girls that hang out with your closest friends or family.” Her boyfriend Dave said.
She shrugged her shoulders. “Whatever, I’m protective.” She said as she took a sip of her Smirnoff Ice.
“Well you don’t have to be with her, she’s a good person.”
Brittany rolled her eyes “Okay.”
Kristen was working herself up as she walked back down the hot dirt road to the cabin. Why the fuck does he even care about my money, it’s got nothing to do with him. She thought to herself, I swear if he says one more thing I’ll embarrass him in front of his friends. She realized she started to think about things that haven’t happened yet, and may not even happen.
“Don’t ever get mad at things that are only happening in theory, it’s pointless and causes stress for no reason.” Her father used to tell her mom back before his death.
Just relax she told herself as she approached the road the cabin stood off of, when she noticed a young man with his arm in a sling looking into the woods.
“Pippin! Come on Pippin.” He whistled into the woods.
She continued to walk toward the cabin. He’ll come back she thought as she walked up the flight of steps to the front door and walked inside.
“Pure, purse, purse.” She said out-loud to herself and looked at the kitchen table and noticed the strap around the shoulder of one of the chairs. She walked over and took out her birth control pills, immediately grabbing a glass of water and taking the yellow one that said Saturday under the aluminum label. She put the pills back in her purse and walked back outside, noticing the man still searching for his dog (assuming a dog of course). She walked back toward the main road when suddenly she got an idea Maybe if Mason sees me helping out another guy….He’ll get a little jealous. Obviously its innocent but maybe it’ll show him to respect me a little more. She hesitated for a moment, as a part of her didn’t want to start any trouble, especially with a man in a sling. But Mason also wasn’t the type of person to just swing on someone either, besides she thought I’m just being a Good Samaritan.
“Hey do you need help?” Kristen yelled to the man, who was actually a really handsome looking guy about Mason’s age when he turned and smiled. His teeth were straight, his hair was cut nice and short, and he had some muscle that she could notice under his t-shirt, not huge but a nice build.
“Oh my God, yes please. Thank you!” He said “My dogs leash broke and he just darted off into the woods after a deer.”
“Oh jeez! You poor thing.” She smiled “I noticed a trailer over this way that leads back that way into the woods if you want to look down there?” She asked.
“Yeah if you wouldn’t mind? I have a tough enough time getting his leash on him when its’ not broken with my arm like this.”
“Yeah, no problem at all. Just have to get back to my boyfriend and his friends at some point.” She threw in just to clear up any confusion with the man.
“No problem, I appreciate your help. I’m Pete.” He reached out his right hand.
“Kristen, nice to meet you.” She said shaking his hand and beginning to walk towards the trail she had seen.
As they walked through the woods leaves glowed a bright green unlike on the dirt road where dust smothered the beautiful landscape, even though the surrounding forest blocked sunlight from entering the trail (aside from some patches here and there that shined along the trail itself.).
“Pippin!” Kristen yelled out as they walked through. “So where are you from Pete?” She asked.
“Oh not too far, just outside of Wildwood, a town called Tolmie. How about you?”
“Tolmie?” She shrugged. “Never heard of it. I’m from Williamstown, it’s about an hour away.”
“Oh! I know Williamstown. It’s a nice area.” He said politely.
“Yeah it’s okay.” She smiled. “Pippin! What kind of dog is he by the way?”
He paused trying to think “Oh, he’s a mutt I think. To be honest I’m not really sure, maybe a Doberman mix of some sort.”
T two of them walked about 75 yards into the trail searching for Pippin. The sound of cars and people faded from the surrounding trees as Kristen began to feel strange, as if something menacing stood next to her. She noticed that he hadn’t called for his own dog once since they entered the trail together. She didn’t want to panic yet though, he hadn’t done anything wrong, or anything to make her feel uncomfortable. You’re over-reacting, She told herself. He’s fine, he’s not a psychopath. You’re just thinking “In theory” like mom used to do. She thought to herself to settle down her gut instinct.
“You know-“She said. “I think I’m going to head back, my boyfriend is probably waiting for me at the lake.”
“Oh, okay.” He said looking down to his feet for a second, and then back up and smiling. “No problem.” He stuck out his hand again. “It was nice to meet you, and thank you.”
She reached for his hand and shook it. “No problem.” She smiled and turned to walk away.
As she walked with her back turned towards Peter a sudden rippling pain reached out across the back of her head like a seismic shockwave. The back of her skull rippled as the bone shattered around the impact of the red metal wrench. Kristen immediately fell on her face, unable to scream, and barely able to move. Moans came out of her mouth as she attempted to crawl forward but her hands wouldn’t work properly from her brain damage.
“I’m sorry to do this.” Peter said as he walked beside her, taking the sling off his head and wrapping the red monkey wrench inside of it. “I really hate this part, but I just can’t help it.”
She moaned sounds that reminded him of something someone with muscular dystrophy might make while in a wheel chair. Peter reached down and spun her around onto her back.
“Look at me!” He said as the girl’s eyes were facing two different directions. “Let me see it happen.” He said as he cupped his hands around her small neck and began to choke her. She didn’t fight back, she just looked up at the trees as he watched her pupils begin to shrink. After a minute it finally happened, he could feel her leave and almost go through him as he dropped her head back onto the ground.
He felt like he just had sex, but with the best orgasm he could’ve ever achieved. He felt whole again, and empowered. Nothing would ever stop him, he thought as he grabbed the sling and wrench and threw it onto Kristen’s life-less body, then grabbed her by the feet and began to drag her off trail and into the woods.
It doesn’t have to be far He thought to himself. Just far enough so they don’t find her for a few hours at least. 30 hours was the max amount of time he had before the police would find her body. 30 hours because for an adult you had to wait 24 hours to send out a missing person’s report for an adult. Once he got her deep enough into the woods from a trailer he began to search her pockets, immediately he grabbed her cellphone and shut it off, then broke the memory chip in it. As he wiped his finger prints off he saw on her hand a silver watched, he loved to take items from his victims. Peter had a whole collection of things from his victims hidden in his bedroom, and that watch would be a nice little piece he thought as he reached down took it off, and put it in his pocket.
29 women in a span of 10 years, he kept track of the amount of women he murdered at this point in his life. He loved to keep track of how many victims he had. Similar to how people keep count how many partners they slept with over the years. Every once in a while he would write a list down of all their names, starting with the first and youngest Janet Hodges. She was 11 and he was 15 at the time, and today was practically 10 year anniversary of her disappearance.
Peter stepped out of the woods and back onto the dirt road, holding the wrench wrapped in the sling in his right hand. He walked over to the cabin which his friends planned to stay at and popped the trunk to his black 2001 Pontiac Firebird and hid the items underneath the spare tire. As he began to walk to the lake to join his sister and friends at the beach he noticed a couple teenage boys on bikes ride into the trail which he just murdered 19 year old Kristen Atkins. Hopefully they don’t find her… He thought to himself. He couldn’t leave the lake too soon, since he had just arrived to hang out with his friends, even though he and Jess just got into a major fight (which he could use as an excuse). He approached the beach and stopped to look for the green umbrella his sister brought, when he finally found it, as he approached he noticed an extra person that hadn’t been there before.
“Mason!” He yelled as everyone turned and looked to him.
“What’s up bro! Long time no see.” Mason said standing up and leaning forward to shake his hand.
“Aiden, what happened with Jess this time?” His sister Brittany asked.
“Just something stupid, don’t worry about it.” He said as he sat down next to Mason.
“I can’t stand that bitch.” Brittany said shaking her head.
“You can’t stand anyone unless you’ve known them as a child.” Aiden alleged.
“I told you!” Yelled Mason. “You have too much of a guard up with people.”
“No, but she’s literally the definition of cunt!”
“Don’t talk about her like that.” Aiden told her, staring deep into her eyes in a threatening manner. His other half wanted to strangle her and slit her throat right then and there, but he actually cared about his sister. The one of very few people he cared about.
“Oh look at him staring angrily, so ferocious.” She snickered. “Speaking of bitches I can’t stand, where’s Kristen?” She asked Mason.
Mason ignored the comment, her drunkenness began to show and he could see it in her eyes. “Good question, let me call her.” He said taking his phone out of his pocket.
“What’d you cut yourself shaving?” Andrea asked Aiden.
“Huh?”
“You have some dried blood on your cheek bro.” She said wiping her left cheek to mimic where to wipe.
“Oh, shit. I must’ve.” He said wiping his cheek and getting the blood on his finger and licking it off.
“You’re disgusting.” Britany said.
“It’s my own blood, whatever.” He rolled his eyes.
Mason looked at his phone confused. “Her phones off or dead.” He said looking over his shoulder.
Off in the distance Aiden could hear a police siren coming in off the highway, his senses began to get heightened as anxiety and stress began to take him over.
“What’s that beeping sound?” Dave asked as everyone looked at Aiden who began staring off at nothing.
“Aiden, your alarm is going off.” Brittany said, but he didn’t answer. He kept staring trying to figure out what to do. “Aiden!” She yelled as he turned to her. “You okay?”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry. Just tired.” He said taking the silver watch out of his pocket to shut off the alarm.
Mason paused and noticed Kristen’s watch. “Where, where did you get that watch?”
“Huh?” Aiden said looking at him.
“Why do you have my girlfriends watch?” Mason asked as police sirens began to enter the camp ground.