Hunger

There was the sensation of blood pooling up in his lips before he vomited it out onto the floor, the black pooling under him mixed in between the red as he dug his hand into his side and stomach while the other scraped across the hardwood laminate floor till the gloss chipped off under his fingernails.

"What did you do to me?" he asked, turning his gaze up to stare at the woman standing before him.

"My sweet, I've made you better," she told him, leaning down to touch his cheek, smearing the weird mixture across his lips and onto his face. She leaned in, pressing her lips harshly against his mouth as he was forced to stay with her there, the thorny binds snaking up around him, latching on till red bled from his bright skin and he tried to push her off, a terrible moan aching from his lips.

He could hear her laughing, forcing something into his mouth that wasn't her tongue and he tried to yank back again fruitlessly before whatever it was snaked down his throat. The moment she pulled herself back, he was on his knees, scrapping at his throat in terror at what she had dropped within him. What dark seed had to planted now?

"God!" he breathed, screaming up to the air, wanting reprieve and some sort of being to be his salvation, but nothing came. No one came. He couldn't recall what was happening, what was going on next, but he swore he saw the image of her just barely out of his peripherals before he fell to the floor, choking as the black started to come up. It was so dark, like the thing that had been forced within him was boiling his own blood to the surface and he was screaming, gurgling and gasping till black spilled over his fingertips and streaked down from his eyes.

Spidery veins of black pulsed beneath his skin, his nails begin to bleed black as he heard the sound of the door shut and suddenly the agony felt like it went from uncomfortable to unbearable and a long, hollow scream echoed from his throat, so much so that it startled him and rang out from the cabin into the pitch black of the night.

How could he be so naïve?

Hours later, Giselle was mixing her foundation in with another, patting her face with the liquid makeup before dabbing it on her face with a wet sponge carefully. She was turning her cheek one way into the mirror and another to get a good glimpse of the other side of her face.

"Have you seen Dillan?" Chise asked, poking her head into the bathroom at her friend. "He was supposed to meet us up here hours ago and he still hasn't shown."

"No, I haven't seen my brother," Giselle told her calmly, squinting into the mirror as she scrutinized her work then pulled back to drop the sponge into the sink and fish into her makeup bag for her eyeliner. "I thought he told me last night he was wanting everything to be perfect between the two of you, so he came up here one night earlier than us so he could set up the cabin for us."

"Well, we're here and he's not," Chise told her, a chill working its way over her. "If this is another one of his pranks, I'm dumping him."

"Your choice, not mine. I didn't tell you to date my brother."

There was a resounding scoff at the remark before she was running her hand over her bobbed black hair and flopping onto the master bedroom's California King size bed. "You're so mean anymore. What happened to us being best friends, you being my biggest supporter?"

"Mm!" she paused on her make up to speak up. "I am! I just think you could do better. Dillan is... He's nice, but my brother is unwittingly annoying. Not the brightest either."

"Oh come on, Giselle. You're my best friend, he's also..." my best friend. "Why can't I be with you both?"

"Okay, one. Ew. You and I used to drink from the same cup. Never again. Two... It's Dillan. Need I say more?" she told her, running her hand over her lips to smudge the makeup there to make sure it wasn't caking.

Chise was quiet, the long silence was less eerie as it seemed to bring on a long sense of dread that she wasn't responding till Giselle's voice floated up again as she stepped out of the bathroom.

"Cheese, don't," she started, looking at her best friend on the bed. "I- Chise?" Giselle was staring at the empty bed in shock, then looking around for her. "Chise?" Her hand was pressing against the frame of the doorway as she stepped out to glance around the empty room and she was wandering into the hallway. "Cheese? I swear, if you're trying to spook me, I'm going to be so mad at you! Where the hell did you go?" She hadn't even heard her get off the bed.

"Mm, mm-ah!"

The shuffle of a muffled cry made Giselle laugh, rolling her eyes. "God, if you found Dillan, then you should have said something instead of letting me just keep blabbering. Get a room you two!" she hollered, snorting to herself before turning around to gasp at Chise's sudden appearance.

She was standing before her, convulsing and gagging as her eyes rolled and then the black started. It poured from her eyes, down like ashy black tears over her face, bubbling up from her lips with small pops of transparency till Chise threw up and Giselle's scream answered her. She was flinging herself back before it hit her as Chise hit the floor, her hands on the floor, nails scraping as she started to moan Giselle's name, her head twisting and then turning to look up for her as her mouth opened, stretching wide as the black substance stretched, muffling the opening of her mouth with it's slick blackness.

"-elp!"

The words were nearly lost, but it was a cry that her mind seemed to recognize before Giselle froze up, watching it push itself seemingly down her friend's throat as she gagged and gasped, sputtering for a fight to push it back up, but the lump moved down her throat as she shrank back. Her hand touched the wall behind her, finally moving herself a step back into the hall before she heard the thick wet slop of something that seemed to peel itself up from the floor somewhere over the bed behind her friend, and then she was staring at the thing. The thing that resembled her brother with haunting black whites and hollowed out black eyes that replaced her brother's eye color. "D-Dillan, if this is your idea of a prank, it sucks! Knock it off! You guys are scaring me!"

His mouth opened, the crackle of his voice against the air seemed to echo as he grabbed the frame, stepping over Chise. "-aigh. Waigh!"

Giselle shrieked, turning to run for the door. She started to grab the handle, unlocking the deadbolt to fling the door open quickly into the dead of the night, crickets chirping when she heard a voice slowly filter up.

"Oh come on, Giselle, he's just asking you to wait. You don't have to run like it's some horror flick. He's just trying to tell you that I've been waiting to talk."

She whipped her head, hard, so much so that it hurt right after doing so as her heart leapt from her throat, but died with her voice, snuffing out any sound of alarm. "K-Karli?"

She smirked, muffling a laugh as she watched her. "Yeah," she sighed softly, her eyes rolling as they flicked over the quieted room, the sound of Dillan and Chise seemed to have been snuffed out the moment she stirred up. "Funny you say that, funny you call me that... It's been so long."

"Wh-what are you doing here?" Giselle gaped at her, tears beading up in her eyes.

"Well," Karli answered. "There- There's so of this beef we have, you know? The last time you brought me here, when you screamed and freaked out and abandoned me down at the lake six summers ago. God, what was it? I think we were juniors in school, weren't we?"

"Y-You were searched for! We searched for you!"

"Yeah," she sighed heavily. "Yeah, I know you did. I watched you."

"Is this some sort of fucking joke?! Six fucking years! What did you do to my brother? Chise even!"

She was nodding at her slowly, snorting as her eyes rolled and flicked back up to her. "Well, I wanted to stop being so lonely. You see... after the accident, I kind of laid there in a state of disbelief. You know? I laid there, thinking, you'd pull me out. You'd find me and there were these hands. God, they were cold. They were enveloping me in this... darkness and I slept for a while longer." Black seemed to slop off her fingertips and she tilted her head back, laughing, the green-black mucus-like thing started to pulse, bubbling up before it made it's own strange sharp cry as if the sound of a newborn baby mixed between the sound of a fawn.

"I came to bring you with me, you know... If it weren't for you I would have never found out my gift. I hated water, you know? Stuff just always gave me this dark sensation. I stayed away... but you kept being so insistent that I was just making things up."

"You said you had nightmares but you'd never been at the water! How the-"

"Sssh," she answered, her voice softening as she flicked yellow eyes up on her friend. "I know. I know... but you have to hear me out. I don't know this area well, Gigi, and I've been sooo very hungry." Her lips cracked at the seemed, peeling back wide to reveal sharp gleaming white teeth. "You have to understand, I- I wanted to see you again. I got so excited when I saw your brother. He was... God, I still have a crush on him I guess, but I guess it's short lived since he found something else to stick his tongue down, but you aren't like that. You're so much better than that."

"G-ge- get away from me!" Giselle screamed, tears flowing down her face as she stepped back.

"Agh, I was afraid you'd say that. That you would reject me," she answered, feigning sadness for a moment. "Oh well. We can be together again in other ways, because I just... this nagging hunger," she moaned, her voice low. "Ugh, it won't stop. Eat. That's all I keep hearing. Eat, eat eat! It's so fucking annoying!" she screamed, stomping her foot on the ground as another mass of black and green slopped down off her back onto the floor, the squelching sound starting to become louder as she flicked her eyes back up to her and then to the floor. "So I just. I'm sorry. I know you didn't kill me or anything. I know I just... stopped being there. It wasn't your fault. Honestly, whatever it was, was mine, but I just want you to know..." She flicked her gazing eyes up at her. "I love you. You're still my best friend, I'm just- Hungry." And the walls were starting to ooze with black, the lights flickering in and out as she twisted her head to the side, nearly touching her shoulder as her mouth opened wide, the black peeling up through from inside her throat, the human skin shedding and the dark, pale enigma of what nearly looked like a whispering dark horse came before her friend. There was a scream and the answered neigh before the lights flicked out in the small cabin, all voices coming to a literal halt and silence overtook the forests.