The cabin had to have been around there somewhere; she just knew it. There hadn’t been any trace of the smiling woman in a couple of days, so Evan had started to relax. Up until her car had taken a shit a couple of miles down the road. She knew she was on the right path, had gotten the directions confirmed from some kid at a café in town. He had to turn and ask his grandmother, the owner Evan guessed, but this was the right road.
Shortly after her car had decided that it no longer wanted to climb hills, Evan had bundled up with what she had in her car just in case it took a bit to get to the cabin or the weather turned. She had been torn between heading back to town to get help or to forge on towards the cabin. She figured the cabin would kill two birds with one stone, so up the hill she went. Her cell phone had stopped working moments before her car had, the service already cutting in and out the whole drive anyway.
While Evan was glad for the opportunity to get out and walk, the forest had looked so beautiful as she drove, she realized she was not equipped for a hike. Her shoes were wrong, she didn’t have quite enough layers, but as long as she stayed out of direct sunlight, she knew she could handle the bugs and avoid a sunburn, possibly.
Her phone had lost service back down the hill, but Evan had kept checking the maps, just in case. The pin for the cabin was out in a sea of green, no discernible road on the screen for her to identify, so she was working on using the nearby roads. The flowers dotting the roadside were wonderful to pass, their aroma permeating the air, and Evan tried to count the species she knew as she went along. The collection was getting more and more diverse, the multicolored flowers interweaving and braiding themselves up and down the mountain. The pattern was lost on Evan, but she could tell that someone had been gardening out in the wilderness.
The irises in front of her seemed to carve a path, perceptible only because of the dappled light of the forest had painted itself on their petals. Evan, looking at the ground, saw that there was a track for tires, and breaking off the side of the road, noticed that it curved off towards the pin in her map. She could tell slightly, mostly by estimation, that the cabin should be a straight shot from here, depending on the obviously less driven path. She was torn again, wondering if she should just continue down the road, but the map she had available made the cabin seem so close. Plus, the old woman’s instructions had said the turnoff was hard to see but to just follow the flowers.
She took a chance and continued on the path, knowing that since it was marked, she could always make her way back to the road, she just hoped that her friend and her new companions would be home. Evan also hoped that Mac would be willing to take her in after all this time. Her friend had disappeared from her, but they had a close connection at one point. Their grandmothers seemed to think the two needed each other.
“She gonna need someone to help reign her in,” Evan’s grandmother admitted to her one day. “That’s where you come in. you wrangle.”
“Wrangle what?”
“Her. When she gets wild. If she gets wild.”
Evan remembered her grandmother holding a photo of Mac’s grandma as she said this.
“Those women got something special about them, but they don’t always know how to control it.”
She laughed.
“One day I’ll have to tell you a story about a mask and a girl wild enough to put it on.”
Evan came over the hill as she was rehashing her talks with her grandmother over the years and saw the cabins in the distance.
“Fucking finally,” she said to herself before trekking off towards what she hoped would be the cabin she needed.
According to the pin, she was looking for number 5, but she didn’t know what end of the properties she was coming in on. She also suddenly grew scared of this being private land that she was trespassing on. Evan knew how country folk reacted to strangers on their land, but Evan was armed with not looking like a hunter, even though it was outside of season anyways. Last thing she needed was some jumpy hillbilly popping off shotgun shots at her. As she grew closer to the cabins, the path she had walked down spit itself out onto the main dirt road that cut through the properties, and Evan realized she must have turned too early.
“Oh well. Got here all the same.”
The first cabin she walked past had smoke coming out of the chimney but no other discernible movement in or around the cabin. Evan looked hard for some indicator of where she might be, which cabin this might be. As she continued on the road, the little wind-chime catching the breeze caught her attention, and she saw the dark “6” highlighted by the metal tubes moving. The next cabin looked to be about a half mile up the road.
“Y’all looking for somethin’?”
The voice rung out behind her, a middle-aged man standing up from kneeling behind a small wood pile.
“Yeah, sorry. My friend’s cabin? Number five? Car broke down, so I’m hoofin’ it.”
“Keep headin’ down that ways. A little confusin’ out here, but the numbers aren’t consistent. You’ll find it though.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Welcome, miss.”
Evan continued down the road, passing number four and number seven before she saw a little marker to turn off to number five. She was glad she had made this trek before the sun had gone down. This would have been impossible in the dark, so she was grateful. The little path led her towards the cabin, and as she approached, she saw a little girl burst forth from the house in a high squeal and take off into the forest. She was carrying some sort of animal skull or mask, the mane of which trailed behind her as she fled.
A man chased out behind her and hadn’t taken notice of Evan as he disappeared into the trees as well. The little girl had seemed horrified, and the man was shouting for her to calm down and to not be scared. Evan froze, unsure of whether she should take off after the girl to help her or to guard herself against the sounds she heard coming crashing from in the cabin itself.
“Alice! Kane! Wait!”
That was Mac’s voice, as far as Evan remembered, but as the door swung open, Evan saw something she didn’t remember. There was a figure in front of her, but the horror of the image wasn’t registering fully with Evan. The woman was partially flayed, the loose skin whipping behind her as she rushed to catch her friends. Evan watched as the thing with the voice of her friend shrugged the loose skin back on, like a jacket, pulling a familiar face on and situating it in her rush. This monstrous thing had her friend’s voice, her friend’s face, but this couldn’t be the Mac she grew up with.
None of the residents had noticed Evan standing in the little drive to their house, and none of them missed her when she fled in the direction she had come.