Chapter Text
|-Saturday evening, March 16th, 2024. Virginia, I95, heading south-|
God I hate these roads. Especially at night. Nothing but black asphalt I can barely see. I need to get better headlights. Speaking of... I haven't seen another car on the road since I passed Richmond. Weird... I get that it's close to midnight but I'd still expect to see someone else driving every now and then. At least give me that as some kind of human connection. Not this darkness and woods. Just me, the road, and the wind... And something else I can't explain. It's like I'm being watched by... something or someone in those trees. Doesn't matter how fast I drive. How far I get from the first instance. The feelings of eyes on me persists. I swear I see glowing red eyes from the tree line. Keeping pace to, which is horrifying. This is I95 I'm on. Speed limit is like, 75 miles per hours. I'm just ten below it. And yet... those eyes keep following. It's probably the lack of sleep. I haven't had a good night's rest in a few days. Can't remember when I closed my eyes in the past 36 hours. I need to change that. I should be coming up on Stony Creek. There's a few hotels just outside of the town, right?
I tap my phone, pulling up the map. Yeah, two roadsides just north of the town. Fairfield and a Sleep Inn. Latter is cheaper. Still, $80 for one night? Jesus... Should've just holed up in Richmond. I keep driving, just enough to see that sign appear in the night. Salvation at last. I pull in and get ready for the night. Pay at the desk. Take only what I need for the morning in with me. Make my way to the second floor. Get through the door and turn on the lights. Two beds, and a charging port by the little TV that I know doesn't work for shit. Why would it? Barely has anything good on it anyhow. It's barely past 9 PM. Wait, seriously? Only 9 pm? Sleep really is hitting me like a truck.
Legs are getting weak. Breaths deeper and longer. The second I hit that pillow, I'm out. Thank fuck.
|-Sunday morning, March 17th. Stony Creek-|
Not the best sleep, but it's better than nothing. Far better. I feel rested. That is until I check the time. Three in the morning? I really couldn't sleep for another two hours, huh? Knowing me, I won't get back to sleep, so I'll just get the road's routine started. Slip out of my clothes. Brush my teeth. Shower. Brush hair. I'm about to get my clothes on when I hear something hit the door. Or rather, the window. At least I think I heard something. I get my clothes on and carefully look through the curtains. Nothing. I swear I heard something. Maybe the lingering sleep deprivation is still messing with me. I pay it no more attention and get my stuff ready. As I finish packing my bag, I hear something hit the window again. This time I'm certain of it. Something soft. Maybe feathers. But it was with some speed and force. I go back to the window, and look out even more carefully. I slowly peek behind the curtain, and see nothing... at first. I scan the tree line that's a good 300 feet away. Something is there and I can't quite explain it. It's more of a feeling than something tangible and quantifiable. You need to be here to really understand what I'm getting at. The air in the room feels off. And the sensation of eyes from last night has come back. Then I see them. Two little beady red dots near the top of the trees. The same ones from last night. Just what are you? And why are you following me? Then I get a feeling that fills me with nothing but dread: Those red eyes looking straight at me. Piercing my soul. I knew they were following me, but now they know I'm here. And I don't know how I feel about this. I can't just leave. Not when those eyes are right there.
I step away from the window, shaken up by everything. Maybe it's still just my head messing with me. It has to be. I'm not some superstitious person. Nor do I believe in magic. It's just my eyes playing tricks on me. I just spent a straight day and a half awake. No sleep. No naps. Nothing. That kind of thing does numbers to the psyche. But what if... No. That's stupid. Just because it's three in the morning doesn't mean that things gets weird. I don't believe in that Witching Hour bullshit. It's just stories and how people understood the world to work before we truly began to look deeper. But that feeling...
thud
Another hit on the window. This time louder. Like whatever did it before wants me to see it. I know I shouldn't. But you know what they say: Curiosity killed the cat. I slowly return back to the window and look out. Nothing out of the ordinary at first until... I look at my car. There's a crow on it. But it looks bigger than it should. And I can't tell if it's because of the light, but it looks like it's made out of gold. Regardless... Just looking at this thing makes me uneasy. It's like it';s something I shouldn't see. You know Lovecraft? What's he most known for? Cthulhu, right? Just one glance at the cephalopodic bastard breaks your entire mind. That's what this feels like. I need to look away, but I can't. Whatever this... thing is... it's got my full, undivided attention. And I do mean thing.
That's not a crow. Fuck. That's not a bird. It's something else. But I can't prove it. Finally, I manage to break free. My heart is pounding. I need coffee. Or something. Anything to forget whatever the hell that was. But that buffet isn't ready yet.
|-Later that morning-|
Food. Thank god. It's about eight right now, and they just got the breakfast bar open. Coffee, eggs, bacon and some toast paired with mindlessly scrolling YouTube. Again, trying to forget what I saw earlier this morning. So I scroll while I eat: Family vloggers getting outed for being shitty people. Deep dives into some obscure 90s horror game. Weird ARGs. Nothing out of the ordinary for me. I then switch to social media, and see I have a message on Instagram. Maddy? Isn't she working at this hour? Maybe she has the day off. I tap it and see what's on her mind.
'How much longer until you cross the state line?' Is what she’s asking. I think about how I'm gonna answer this. I've been driving nonstop for almost two days. I'm coming down from Phillie. I should've been in Wilmington by now. But I had to get a job done first before heading out.
'I had to stop for the night. Haven't sleep in a day and a half and needed the rest.' I respond, seeing the three dots that mean she’s typing out her response. Looks like she keeps rethinking until she sends it. The dots appear then disappear multiple times.
'Oh... Right... Forgot... Sorry...' She finally gets out. Bad habit of hers: apologizing when she didn’t do anything that warrants it.
'If I start driving now, I can get to Wilmington in like, three hours, give or take ten minutes.' I tell Maddy. That seems to satisfy her as I don't get another response. Better make good on that promise. I quickly finish eating, down the rest of my coffee and head out. Get in my vehicle. Key in the ignition. Turned. Engine roars to life and I'm soon on the road. Asphalt running smoothly under the tires is a feeling that never gets old. Well... as smoothly as US roads can be. But I can't complain. Not at all...
...
...
...
Until a bird shits on my windshield. God dammit. The universe is testing me. I briefly look around and see nothing. Bird's probably a bit too high but then I hear cawing. A crow. Great. A... A crow... And then this morning comes flooding back. The red eyes. Those golden feathers on that... "bird". And then I see the crows. A whole murder. One bigger than it should be. I feel like I've been cursed by... something. This is gonna be a helluva weird month. Let's just hope this is as weird as it gets.