#proxys

But there you are, in your same bed, looking out your foggy window into the woods that haven't changed a bit. Your dad still drunk as a skunk in the vacant living room, and the house still sighed with every settle as day bled into night- all quieter than the last. All the same routine, the same clockwork that would drive anyone to the brink of insanity. 

Even the grief had stayed, a cold hand gripping hard onto your shoulder. A presence that seems to fill every corner and gap.. With an abundance of love nowhere else to go, it lingered, and it haunted every inch of your room. 

When everything would fall into silence and you’d be left with nothing but your thoughts, you would revisit that night. Either to cope, or because the alternative was far more frightening than you’d like to give thought, you told yourself it’d all be some dream. A hallucination- a break in your psyche when you’d been pushed too far. That’s why you’d made it home that evening, under the watchful eyes of the moon. 

That and nothing more. 

Now a year later you could barely even remember all the finer details. Every now and then your gaze seemed to wander on its own accord out to that treeline as if expecting something more than trees, but each time you were met with simply all the same. Perhaps it’d been nothing at all. Just a shadow, or a trick of your tired, blurry eyes. 

If not that, then you would be faced with wondering just what kind of creature would walk away from prey. 

-

Town was just as empty as you thought it was going to be. A few smaller shops that catered to farmers and hunters, maybe three or four tiny restaurants. None of which were hiring, you’d learned, almost all them equally struggling to stay afloat with the staff they already had. That, and you found pretty quickly that this small town was the epitome of close knit. Generation after generation grew up, lived and died quiet lives, all known by name and by the features their parents had passed down to their kin. 

“You ain’t from around here.” You heard more than you’d heard ‘hello’. “How did you end up in a place like this?” 

Place like this was certainly right. Of course you knew money was tight, and the options were far more than just limited, but you think it truly was impossible to be further off the map. People were strange here. Off in a way that made you look over your shoulder, or avoid the hard stare of those wondering where you’d came from. Your dad certainly wasn’t doing you any favors for sure- causing scenes wherever he went, an outspokenly bitter man that found it easier to make enemies than friends. 

Odd jobs became your one and only sauce of income, because thankfully, there were plenty of older folks who really did not want to bother themselves with lawn care or washing their cars anymore. It was little pay, but it was good honest work. Which was more than you could say for your father. They always made sure to tell you that as they handed over a few bucks.

You’d take your meager pay and use it to buy whatever canned goods were on clearance, and with your leftovers you’d visit that little arcade that’d piqued your interest. 

From what you could tell, despite the way they eye’d you like some sort of alien, the older people were kind enough. They always appreciated your work ethic, and that you’d always get the job done, rain or shine. The younger generations… We’re another story. They ran like wild dogs, always itching for something violent to do, like they never had a good solid smack across the cheek before. They liked that you were quiet, and closer to timid than anything otherwise. Liked how when they’d tug on your shoulders or your hood on the bus you’d simply let them.

And they really liked how you were always alone. 

When you weren’t in town, and you couldn’t stomach another moment in that decrepit house of yours, you were in that long stretch of woods barricading your home from the rest of town. In the daytime it was lovely- all colors and a swift breeze carrying only the freshest of nature's scent. It became your safe place, out there. All alone with nothing more to worry about than the sun falling down behind the horizon. 

Headphones on, a book tucked under your arm, your world collapsed into a narrow tunnel of peace. You’d even found about a half mile in a giant apple tree had been flourishing, bearing the brightest, ripest apples you’d ever seen. Tart, crisp, and the only things that felt alive among everything else. 

The path to it was worn now, a long track of flattened grass and wet leaves you’d made with every trip until that pale trunk would emerge from the thick. Craned, leaning heavier on one side than the other, with great twisting branches that dipped down just within your reach. Always heavy with fruit, as if nature had pitied your empty belly. 

Today is no different. The tree extends its hand out to you, offers its labors, and you’re grateful to receive. 

Wind carries the scent of pine and sap, a chill littering your skin with goosebumps. Sitting on a log without a care in the world, you chomp into the apple you’d picked and split your book open in your lap. 

For a time, it helps you paint a picture that seems… Normal. 

If it were like this all the time you’d find yourself to feel at home. City life was as loud as it was chaotic, but your mother taught you to navigate it well. But in your soul you knew you belonged somewhere quieter- somewhere like these woods, surrounded by life and colors. Isolation became bandages over your injured heart. So what, you felt lonelier than an island miles from the mainland. At least you could hear your own thoughts, now. 

So what sometimes you swore you heard the faint shuffling of footsteps through the loose leaves. And so what other times you’d feel the weight of a long, hidden stare through the trees. 

As long as you had your music, a good book to read, and something fresh to snack on, you told yourself you were happy.

But all good things come to an end, of course, and long before you were content to go the sun disappeared behind the trees while darkness crept in where rays of light once had been. You hesitate for a moment, wondering if you could squeeze another twenty minutes or so, but then you feel that familiar thrum of anxiety sinking into your gut and you decide otherwise. Best to head back now, while there’s still sun to guide your way. 

Your father pulls into the drive the same time as you breach the treeline, coming from god knows where, and you make a point to slither in before he does so you don’t have to pass him by. When he stumbles through the front door, you’re already tucked away into the solitude of your bedroom with your headphones beating rhythms into your eardrums. His voice drifts through the wood walls, low and slurred. Talking to someone on his phone, you realize, and you turn your music volume down to listen in.

“...Don’t like these damn woods,” You make out, his words running together, a stream of incoherent thoughts. “...Tellin’ you somethings out there watchin…”

A frown graces your features, a tight draw of your brows. You can’t help but get up and press your ear to the door, removing your headphones all together. 

“...Saw a dog out there last week but-” He’s right outside your door, agitation growing in his voice by the second. “Thing’s face was all fucked up. Like it was smilin’ at me. You ever heard a’ that?”

You try to imagine it- a smiling dog- but all that comes to mind is some poor mutt casting a wrong glance at your father. Wrong place, wrong time. That’s all it takes after all, and you know your father isn’t above shooting things he considers vermin. A glass clinks, and you can audibly hear him chugging down his drink before he sputters out a wet burp. 

The last thing you make out before he slams his bedroom door shut is equal parts manic and chilling. 

“Goin’ inta’ town to grab myself a sawed off. Like ta’ see that thing come sniffin round’ my yard again. Or, hell… I’ve still got my ol’ bow. That’ll do.”

And then you’re stuck there, glued with your ear to the door, terrified at the thought of him lugging home some big ass gun he’d definitely use to throw his weight around. A feeling grows in your belly, a low churn of apprehension that plants seeds of fear. 

-

Tomorrow he’s no better. Worse, even. Angry from the moment he rose all the way into the later afternoon, and you were careful to stay out of his way during it all. The sky mimics his rage- fat, dark clouds in the distance floating towards your little town like an omen of death. A promise of rain lingers in the scent, something in the wind cold and sharp. 

When he finally sinks into a nap in the living room, only then do you saunter out and decide it’s about time to eat something. Empty cabinets are all you’re met with. Spider webs in the corners, as hollow as you felt. If anything though, you were almost grateful at the excuse to head into town and escape the tension of existing beside your father. 

You don’t plan to wake him when you leave, nor do you intend to lock the door on your way out. But the second the latch clicks and you twist the knob, you hear his voice creeping down the hall from the other room. 

“N’ where tha’ hell are you goin’?” Alcohol speaks for him, hardly processable if you weren't already fluent in the language. 

You chew your cheek. “I’m gonna grab us something to eat.”

“We got food.”

Your fingers still clutch the knob, wondering if you should just leave anyways. “We don’t. Fridge is empty. Pantries empty. You’re not hungry?”

“Gettin’ too dark for you to be runnin’ round. N’ I don’t like that tone. What’re you up to, really?”

“I just wanna go to the corner mart on Birch road.” The agitation in his words makes you nervy, but the slur of his intoxication brings forth something angrier. Something ugly, and bitter. For a moment, he doesn’t answer, as if considering. 

But then he speaks again- lower now. 

“Nah. Get back to yer’ room, is whatya’’ gonna do.”

Hunger rolls in your belly. Your jaw ticks. “Why?”

With a sudden shift of movement in the living room, your blood runs cold, whipping around, expecting to see him come barreling down the hall. 

He doesn’t. 

Instead, he peeks around the bend, looking just as flushed as he sounded. 

“No needta’ be pokin’ around out there.”

You shift your weight, struggling to meet his eyeline, the fire in your eye dying away. “...I’m hungry.”

He grinds his teeth and watches you. 

“Fine,” he starts, disappearing entirely back into the living room. You hear his weight meet the couch, but you’re not out of the woods yet. When he speaks again, it’s quiet, dripping in a disdain you can’t quite place the source from. “I ain’t gonna’ fight ya’. You go n’ stay out there tonight. Like a damn dog.”

Your mouth opens, and then it snaps itself shut on instinct. Between his phases of insisting you stay locked inside at all hours and then not caring if you would disappear at all, the changes always give you a whiplash that’s impossible to keep up with. 

You tell yourself it’s because he’s drunk. And because just like you, he’s still grieving too. The ghost of your mom’s memory wraps long, spindly fingers around both of your throats in tandem. But truly you can’t help but wonder if he simply just likes scolding you. Likes having something real and tangible to funnel all that anguish towards. 

He’s giving you the okay, you tell yourself. Just go. 

So, you do, pulling your headphones over your ears. You make sure to leave the door unlocked as you go. 

The trip to the bus stop is uneventful, the ride to the only market not so much. With a brain already pressed taut under stress, your senses go ablaze, aware of every stare as you settle in at the end of the bus. Some more than others- particularly a group of guys roughly the same age as you that seem to snicker among their not-so-subtle glances. 

Music only blurred the edges so much, and did little for the pit of dread growing within you.

You aren’t well versed in this. Despite still lacking a good solid friendship you were always surrounded by brightness, or at the very least, smiling faces. Even those you didn’t know knew your mother and her reputation often bled onto you: her precious daughter. Even if you felt invisible sometimes, you loved it. Bathed in that bright light of hers all the way until chirpy conversations became quiet, hushed condolences. 

Now, you were the outlier. An intruder. And an easy target.

Though they don’t act as if they aren’t talking about you, when you get up and pass them by at your exit, they do nothing. It’s enough to allow you breathe out a sigh when the bus pulls off the stop and you’re properly left alone. 

At checkout, an armfull of cans you didn't even bother you check the labels of sprawled out on the counter top, the cashier eyes you up and down while someone in line behind you chatters about the woods at the edge of town. The one that kisses the line of your backyard. You can’t help but tune in- it’s practically your property, after all.

Something about disappearances in the town, and how the police won’t search deeper than a mile or so into that great darkness. 

“I’ll never go there again after, well.. you know.” One of them remarked, a dramatic fall to the end of her sentence. “I can’t believe they won’t even check the woods again.”

“I can. It’s crazy out there. I saw a husky out in the woods one time and it tried to attack me.” The other harped. “It was smiling at me the whole time! Like actually smiling.”

Huh. That dog, again. 

For just the briefest of moments, and for the very first time, you think, you wonder if maybe your dads eyes hadn’t deceived him. 

“I heard someone’s living in the house at the end of Willow now. Can’t imagine looking out my window and seeing those woods.” 

“Jeez, I’d never sleep again. I give em’ a month, tops.”

You almost spin around and demand an explanation. 

But then reality checks you as the cashier clicks her tongue at your vacant state, out stretching a palm for payment. You pay with whatever money you had left and she sends you on your way, waiting once again for the bus to come round. 

The entire ride home, you replay their conversation in your head. 

By the time you get home, the clouds had gathered above thicker than fleece. Rain poured down hard enough to soak you in seconds flat, hair stuck to your face in ribbons and your paper bag of cans sagging in your arms. Dad’s car is in the driveway, and nerves rise up in your chest. Try as you might to preserve your headphones by tucking them around your neck, you’re sure they’re fried under all the wetness.

You hope he’s asleep. Or too drunk to remember your last conversation, at least. He usually is.

Before you make it to the front door the paper bag gives away in a slurry of brown tatters and tumbling cans. Most of them exceed your clutches and thud onto the gravel before rolling away, cracking open at the seams and landing in gathering puddles of water amidst the rain. One splits and blossoms what would have been a mouthful of stew. 

And all you can do is watch it. It chases the stream of water through the pebbles, a torrent of chunks and brown, feeding the dirt. Defeat would be an understatement- something almost entirely empty hollowing you from the inside out. A feeling that makes you wonder why you even bother bending down to pick up the few that survived.

It takes only one arm now to carry them up to the door, so with your head hung low you reach out to twist the knob to welcome shelter. 

The knob doesn't twist. You try again- it doesn’t budge an inch.  Your heart falls. 

You go n’ stay out there tonight. Like a damn dog.

As if laughing, a roll of thunder echoes among the heaven-high clouds, harbored in a sheet of despair that put in effort to rain even harder. Every droplet stung your skin, a reminder of what your father had said. For some reason, a naive reason, you hadn’t believed he’d truly leave you out tonight. 

Not with that strange dog. Not with these strange woods looming only a backyard away. 

You’re sure he’s asleep somewhere inside, warm and cozied up with a beer bottle at his side. His one and only companion. As for you, not so much.

Turning around, nothing opens its arms to you. If anything the world grows claws and fangs, threatens to close in at all sides and tear you apart right there. A sky darkening by the second, trees that bend forward with spindly arms. The long winding driveway and then… 

Your fathers car. 

Without giving it a second thought, you step through the wet gravel and jiggle the handle of his front door. It pops open, revealing the interior, a flash of relief drooping your tormented shoulders. 

This will do.

After unlocking the entire car and tossing the cans onto the passenger, you crawl into the backs and let your aching muscles sprawl out over the fake leather. The whole ride reeks of cigarettes and beer, tiny holes of ashes burnt into the fabric roof and car seats. 

Your headphones did not, in fact, survive the storm. But thankfully you will- albeit hungry enough for your belly to fold in on itself. The thought occurs to you that you should have just stayed inside like your father had said in the first place. Sure you’d be just as hungry, but you’d be inside, warm and buried under the weight of your blankets. 

But then that meant conceding to him yet again. And for some reason within the latest weeks, that was becoming harder and harder. With every new rot of the wooden floors, and with every day spent scrounging for food hardly worth the effort it took to acquire it, the scorn you felt in your chest only grew worse. 

Everything was coming down around you with no future in sight. If only your mom’s passing could have meant something- could have brought you two together, or maybe opened his damn eyes. But no. He was content to drink away his woes and watch you turn to dust an arms length away. The word love became a memory. Family became a curse. 

You roll onto your back, staring up at the roof. 

This couldn't be your life. There had to be something else out there for you, just out of sight. Waiting for the right moment. As your breathing slows into something languid, you force yourself to imagine it- whatever it even is. 

What your brain comes up with is simple, lovely. Long days, longer nights. Clouds of gold that stretch into deep blues and a sky full of stars. A moon that always seems to smile back. 

Running through an endless sea of trees surrounded by laughter and the undeniable feeling of belonging. 

Now that brings a smile to your face. 

And strangely enough, all alone in that back seat with nothing but the rain to sing you off, sleep comes swiftly. With it, comes a dream fresh off the burners of your mind. 

The car full of quiet, windows fogged as the rain dies down. For just a second in your haze your eyes crack open to reveal nothing but deep, blue, darkness. Then, though it’s a blur too hard to make out entirely, you see the shape of something at the window. When your eyes adjust you make out only the biggest details- the roundness of a pulled hood. A mask of blue catches a sliver of light and reveals eyes of inky black tar. 

Recognition comes quickly. That night a year ago, among the trees and the brush, watching you cry yourself silly.

You know it’s a dream because you should be afraid. Downright terrified, actually, like cornered prey shaking before its predator. But that fear doesn’t come. Not even when they tilt their head in that same curiosity. There’s something about them that doesn’t frighten you this time around, like you know in your very soul that this… Stranger isn’t a threat to you this time around. If they even were, in the first place. 

For some reason you can’t help but stare right back. The two of you just watching, studying. Understanding. 

The dream carries on until the dead of night turns into the earliest hours of the morning. Only when the sky fades into a shade light enough to color him does he leave, and you watch that dark shape shift out of view. 

Somehow, when they go, the emptiness that arrived with them left only the softest of peace. Protection, your brain tried to reason. So desperate for it that your mind had forced itself to concoct some sad, pitiful dream to lull you into a state of comfort. 

It works. So well, in fact, that even when the dream changes and that moment is long forgotten into the remainder of your slumber, you rest better than you had in weeks.