Speaker 1: On Tuesday morning, I received a message from Marcus. At
first I almost ignored it. Marcus and I hadn't spoken
in years, and the preview just showed my name followed
by a question mark. I figured it was some old
contact cleaning thing, or maybe he was trying to reconnect
out of the blue. But then I opened it. Hey,
I don't know if you heard Ethan died last night.
I read it again. Then again. It didn't feel real. Somehow,
it still felt like he still existed out there. I
typed back before I really knew what I was asking.
What happened? Five minutes fell like five hours as I
stared at my phone. Then I saw the typing bubble.
They're saying suicide. That was it. I sat there for
a long time after that. Ethan and I hadn't spoken
in almost six years, not properly anyway. There had been
the occasional message from him, a text every now and
then a Facebook notification where he tagged a few of
us in something I hadn't replied to most of them.
It wasn't because I hated him, nothing like that. It
was just easier not to, especially when I knew what
the conversation would eventually turn into it always did. The
last message he'd sent me was about eight months ago.
I remember it clearly because I stared at it for
a long time before deciding not to respond. Do you
remember exactly what happened that day in the woods? No? Hello? Oh,
no catching up? Just that. I closed the message and
told myself i'd respond later, but I forgot. Marcus sent
another message a few minutes later, with a funeral information.
It was happening that Saturday back in town. I almost
didn't go. The idea of driving back there after so
long made my stomach not up in a way I
couldn't quite explain. But something about the message Marcus had
sent kept sticking with me. They're saying suicide. Something about
that didn't sit right. It's not like Ethan didn't seem
happy or stable or anything like that. The truth was,
I had no idea what Ethan's life looked like anymore.
But the Ethan I remembered wasn't someone who would just
quietly disappear. If anything, he was the one who refused
the lectings stay buried. Especially that Saturday came faster than
I expected. The town looked smaller than I remembered. When
I drove in, streets that had once felt wide and
endless now seemed narrow and oddly quiet. Stores I remembered
were gone or replaced by things that didn't belong there.
The church was exactly the same, though, same brick walls,
a crooked sign out front with changeable letters. Cars lined
the gravel lot. When I pulled in for a moment,
I just sat in my car with the engine off.
I almost turned round and left instead. I got out inside.
The place smelled faintly like old wood and flowers. Quiet
conversations echoed softly under the high ceiling. Most of the
people there were older than I remembered, teachers, neighbors, people
who had known us when we were kids. I spotted
Marcus sitting near the back of the room, his hands
shoved deep into the pockets of a dark jacket. He
looked older than I remembered. He saw me and gave
a small nod. I walked over. We stood there awkwardly
for a moment before either of us spoke Hey. He
said hey. Marcus glanced toward the front of the room,
where a closed casket sat surrounded by flowers. Claire's here,
he said. After a moment I followed his gaze. She
was sitting in one of the pews near the aisle,
shoulders slightly hunched, staring down at her hands. Her hair
was shorter than I remembered. When she looked up and
noticed us, she gave a small, uncertain wave. Sam was
standing a few rows behind her. He looked the least
changed out of all of us. Same posture, same skeptical expression,
like he'd just been told something he didn't quite believe.
When he saw me, he lifted his chin in a greeting.
The four of us hadn't been in the same room
together in over ten years, not since the summer before
high school started, back when everything still felt simple, back
before we all agreed to stop talking about what happened.
No one mentioned it. Now we stood together near the
back while people filtered in and found their seats. Conversations
between us stayed small and safe. Work where people lived.
Now how long it had been since we'd been back
in town. Claire kept glancing toward the kaskar, like she
wanted to look, but couldn't quite bring herself to. Marcus
didn't look at all. Sam eventually crossed his arms and
leaned against the wall, anyone hear what actually happened? He
asked quietly. Marcus just shook his head. Just what I
texted you, guys. Sam frowned slightly, but didn't comment further.
Claire spoke next, her voice softer than I remembered he
messaged me last month. That got everyone's attention. What about
Marcus asked Claire hesitated, Then she said it the woods.
A strange silence fell over the four of us. Sam
sighed almost immediately, like he'd been expecting that answer. Of
course he did. Claire looked at him. He asked if
I remembered exactly what happened that day. I felt their
attention shift toward me. For a moment I considered lying instead,
I just nodded, yeah, I said me too. Marcus just
looked down with avoidance. None of us spoke after that,
because in truth, we all knew why Ethan had been
contacting us, even if none of us wanted to say
it out loud. After the service ended, people drifted slowly
out of the church in quiet clusters, handshakes, muted condolences.
That strange heavy politeness that follows funerals, where everyone speaks
softer than usual. The four of us stood near the
parking lot for a while, sure what to do next.
Claire was the first to say something, there's still that
diner by the highway right. Marcus nodded, Yeah, it's still there.
Sam shrugged, might as well. We all seemed to understand
the same thing at the same time. None of us
were ready to go home, yet we drove separately and
met there twenty minutes later. The diner looked exactly the
way it always had, same faded red booths visible through
the window, even the same bell over the door that
gave a dull jingle when you stepped inside. It felt
strange walking into a place that hadn't changed when everything
else had. We slid into a booth near the back,
Marcus and I on one side, Simon and Claire across
from us. For a few minutes, the conversation stayed careful
and surface level. Claire had moved to Denver a few
years ago worked in graphic design. Marcus stayed closer to
home than the rest of us construction jobs mostly. Sam
lived in Chicago, now doing something with software that he
described in vague terms, and no one really pressed him
on it. I talked about my job just enough to
keep the conversation moving. In that moment, it was clear
that if we ran out of small talk, the topic
would gravitate back towards what we'd been avoiding. Eventually, Sam
asked the question that had been sitting there the whole time, Marcus,
when was the last time you talked to Ethan? Marcus
leaned back, slightly, rubbing his thumb along the edge of
his coffee mug. In the last few years, he only
messaged me about one thing. The words seemed to settle
over the table like dust. Nobody spoke, Marcus continued. After
a moment, he asked if I remembered exactly what happened.
Sam looked at him, unimpressed. Seriously, we were twelve, he added, kids,
Mike stuff up. His tone carried the kind of casual
dismissal that meant he didn't want the conversation going in
that direction. Marcus shook his head immediately. No, he said,
Sam raised an eyebrow. No. What No, something happened the
way Marcus said. It made the booth feel smaller. Claire
shifted uncomfortably in a seat. We all remember something, she said, quietly.
That's not the same thing as it being real, Sam replied.
Marcus looked at him. You remember digging, right, Sam sighed
and leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. Yer
He admitted, I remember digging. Claire spoke again. It was
behind the old logging road. I felt something tighten in
my chest as the memory surfaced. We used to ride
our bikes in the woods behind town during the summer.
It was a stretch of forest that began just past
the last row of houses and stretched for miles. Old trails,
half collapsed tree stands, rusted signs from logging operations that
had shut down years before. We found something buried out there.
Sam rubbed his face with both hands. Jesus, he muttered.
Claire looked up at him. You remember it too. Sam
didn't respond right away, but he didn't deny it either.
For a moment, the only sound at the table was
the faint clinking of dishes somewhere behind the counter. Marcus
looked at each of us in turn, you remember what
we said? After? Claire nodded slowly. Sam stared down at
the table. I didn't say anything, because we all remembered
that part clearly. The four of us and Ethan standing
in that clearing with the dirt piled around a hole.
We dug terrified, confused and agreeing on one thing. We
would bury it again, and we would never talk about
it ever. The coffee and our corps had gone cold,
but no one seemed to care. We seemed stuck in
our own heads. Around us, the diner started filling up
with the late afternoon crowd. The quiet clatter of dishes
in low conversation drifted, but it all felt strangely distant.
Marcus was the one who finally broke the silence. What
do you actually remember? He asked. He wasn't looking at
any one in particular when he said it. Sam leaned
back in the booth. What do you mean? You know
what I mean? Marcus said, that day, what do you
remember happening? Sam gave a tired laugh. Man, that was
twenty years ago, yeah, Marcus said, but do you remember it?
Another pause settled over the table. Then they all looked
at me. I hadn't realized that till that moment that
I had been avoiding thinking about it. Even hearing the
woods mentioned earlier had brought back only fragments, shapes without details,
feelings without context. But when Marcus asked, the question directly.
The memory came back all at once, not clearly, but enough.
I stared down into my coffee and said, it was summer.
Sam rolled his eyes a little. That narrows it down. No,
I said, I mean it was one of those really
hot days. All five of us biked out there, Ethan
in front because he was the fastest, Marcus and Sam
arguing about something behind him, Claire riding next to me.
The logging road had already been half reclaimed by the forest.
Back then, tall grass growing through the gravel branches leaning
over the trail, so he had to dock under them.
We ditched the bikes where the road ended and walked
the rest of the way. I could see it clearly now,
the clearing. Ethan was the one who spotted it first. There,
he said, slowly, that patch of dirt. Claire looked up immediately.
You remember that too, I nodded. There was this spot
where the ground looked like it had been disturbed, like
something had been dug up and filled back in. The
dirt wasn't backed down the same way as the rest
of the forest floor, the grass hadn't grown back properly.
It looked like someone had buried something recently. Even back then,
we knew it. Ethan had walked over and kicked at it.
I remember that, Marcus said quietly. He started digging, I continued.
None of us had tools, obviously we were twelve, so
we used sticks, branches, our hands, anything that could find purchase.
The dirt came up easier than it should have, packing
under our fingernails. Sam shifted in his seat. Yeah, he said.
We were digging for a while. I nodded. Then we
hit something. I could still remember the dull clunk as
ethan stick struck something hard beneath the dirt. We cleared
the soil away until we could see part of it.
It was metal, I said. Sam frowned immediately. No it wasn't.
I looked up at him. Yes it was. No, he
said firmly, it wasn't metal. Claire leaned forward slightly. What
do you mean, Sam rubbed the back of his neck.
It was wood. The three of us stared at him. Would.
Marcus asked, yeah, Sam said, like a crate or a
box or something. That's not what I remember. I said,
it's what it was, Sam replied. He leaned forward, now
more animated. It had boards, like old boards, and there
was a symbol carved into the top. What symbol, Claire asked.
Sam hesitated, I don't know. Something weird, like a circle
with lines through it. I shook my head slowly. There
wasn't any symbol. Sam gave a frustrated laugh. Dude, yes
there was. Marcus held up a hand. Wait, we looked
at him. You both might be wrong. Claire blinked what
Marcus leaned back slightly. It wasn't metal, and it wasn't wood.
So what was it, Sam asked. Marcus hesitated stone. The
word hung there, Marcus continued, like a slab, part of
something bigger underground. Claire sat very still. That's actually closer
to what I remember, but not right. Sam threw his
hands up. Okay, that makes zero sense. Claire ignored him.
I remember Ethan brushing dart off something flat, she said, slowly,
like a lid, exactly, Marcus said. Sam shook his head. No,
it was a I'm telling you. I tried to picture
it again, the object beneath the dirt. But the more
I thought about it, the less certain I felt, because
the memory that stood out the most wasn't the object itself.
It was the sound we heard something. I said Claire
nodded immediately yes, Sam frowned. What sound? I looked between them.
A knocking sound. Marcus tilted his head slightly. What like
something hitting the inside of the thing, I said, three
or four dull tabs. Knock, knock, knock. Claire shook her
head slowly. That's not what it was. Then, what was it,
I asked. Claire's voice dropped when she answered it was breathing.
Sam'scoffed No, it wasn't. Yes, it was, Claire insisted. She
looked at me. It was slow, like something was breathing
under the ground. I felt a chill move through me.
Marcus had gone very quiet. Finally, he said, you're both
missing something. Sam leaned back again, Oh, here we go.
Marcus didn't respond to the sarcasm. You're all remembering the digging,
he said, and the sound. But that's not the part
that stuck with me. Claire looked at him. What part?
Marcus took a slow breath, The part before we left.
None of us said anything. Marcus looked at each of
us in turn. You remember we left the woods, right obviously,
Sam said. Marcus nodded, yeah, but something happened right before that.
Claire frowned. What do you mean? Marcus looked down at
the table. Then he said, quietly, Ethan talked to it.
The words seemed to pull the air out of the booth.
Sam stared at him. No, he didn't, Yes he did.
Marcus said, I've felt my stomach tighten. What do you
mean he talked to it? Marcus rubbed his palms together slowly.
He leaned down into the hole. He paused, thinking about
how to phrase what he was about to say, and
he said something. What did he say, Claire asked. Marcus
shook his head. I don't remember exactly. Sam laughed nervously.
You're seriously saying Ethan had a conversation with a hole
in the ground. Marcus didn't smile. He said something First,
Marcus repeated, and then Clare leaned forward, and then what.
Marcus looked up at us, and then something answered. For
a little while after Marcus said that, none of us spoke,
the noise of the diner seemed louder suddenly, fouks clinking
against plates, someone laughing near the counter, a drug rumbling
past outside, normal sounds, things that didn't belong next to
the sentence we just heard. Sam finally broke our silence.
That's not possible, he said flatly. Marcus shrugged slightly. But
there wasn't any humor in it. I'm just telling you
what I remember. Sam looked at the rest of us,
waiting for someone to back him up. No one did.
Claire was staring down at the table again, fingers tracing
circles on the laminate's surface. That's not the part I remember,
she said quietly, But I do remember something else. She
reached into a bag and pulled out her phone. Ethan
had been messaging me for months. Marcus nodded same. Here.
Sam frowned about the woods again. Claire unlocked her phone
and scrolled through something before turning the screen towards us.
It wasn't just the woods. There was a conversation thread
with Ethan. Most of the messages were short, sent days
or sometimes weeks apart, but they all had the same
tone questions. Claire pointed at one near the middle. Did
we bury it again? Another a few lines down? Did
we actually close it? Further down the thread? Do you
remember what it said? Sam shifted in his seat. That
doesn't mean anything, he said, though his voice wasn't as
confident as before. Marcus pulled his phone out. Next he
sent me the same kind of stuff. He opened one
of the conversations and slid the phone across the table.
More questions, direct, almost frantic. Are you sure we covered
it back up? Did you hear it too? Think about
it carefully? Do you remember what it said? I felt
a tightness building in my chest. Did he ever say
why he was asking? I said? Marcus shook his head,
not exactly, He hesitated, then added, but he did say
something else? What? Claire asked? Marcus looked around the table
before answering he had been going back out there. Sam
frowned out where the woods. Claire blinked recently. Marcus nodded,
last few months. Sam scoffed weakly. Why would he do that?
Marcus didn't answer right away. Instead, he leaned forward slightly.
The last message he sent me, he said, wasn't a
question about our memories? What was it? I asked? Marcus
looked down at his phone again. Then he read it
out loud. What if we didn't bury it? What if
it buried itself again? No one said anything For a
moment after Marcus read the message, it just sat between
us outside the diner window the sky had started turning
that dull gray collar it gets before evening. The parking
lot lights flickered on one by one, casting long reflections
across the glass. Sam rubbed his face with both hands.
This is ridiculous, he said. Eventually, we're sitting here trying
to piece together twenty year old memories because Ethan sent
a few weird texts. Marcus didn't respond. Claire was staring
at Ethan's messages again. What if he wasn't just remembering
things wrong, she said quietly. Sam looked at her. What
do you mean, Claire set her phone down on the table.
What if he was trying to figure something out? Sam
led out a short laugh about what some imaginary box
we dug at when we were twelve. Marcus leaned forward.
You heard the messages, yeah, Sam said, I heard them,
and Marcus asked, and people get weird when they're dealing
with stuff. Sam replied, maybe he was depressed, Maybe he
got stuck thinking about something for and when we were kids.
Claire shook her head. That's not what this feels like.
Sam opened his mouth to argue again, but she kept going.
He asked if we buried it again? She looked at
each of us. What if we didn't, Sam scoffed. Of
course we did. Are you sure, she asked. Sam hesitated
only for a second, but it was enough. Claire leaned
back slightly in the booth. Marcus said Ethan had been
going back out there. Marcus nodded more than once. The
dinah suddenly felt too warm. I found myself staring at
the condensation of my water glass, watching a drop slowly
slide down the side. Claire spoke again, we should go,
Look led out a disbelieving laugh. You're serious, yes, for what?
He asked closure. Claire didn't answer right away. Then she
said Ethan's parents gave me something after the service. She
reached into a bag again and pulled out a small
wooden container. It took me a second to understand what
it was. Sam's expression shifted when he realized you're saying,
we scatter his ashes out there, he said. Claire nodded once.
It seems like something he would have wanted. Sam leaned
back again, staring at the ceiling for a moment. This
is insane, he muttered. Marcus didn't look convinced either, but
he didn't object. Instead, he asked, you mean tonight Claire
shrugg all tomorrow morning. Sam was quiet for a long moment,
then he sighed heavily, fine, he said. Everyone looked at him,
but only so we can finally stop talking about this.
He added. We go out there, scatter the ashes, see
there's nothing there, and we move on. Claire nodded slowly.
Marcus gave a small shrug. Works for me. The attention
drifted toward me. I hadn't spoken since Claire first suggested it.
The thought of going back to those woods after all
this time made something twist in my stomach. But the
truth was I'd been thinking the same thing since Marcus
mentioned Ethan returning there. If Ethan had gone back, if
he'd been digging again, then maybe the thing we buried
it wasn't just a half forgotten childhood story. Maybe he
was still there waiting. Miswallowed and nodded. Okay, I said
we'll go. We decided to go the next morning. No
one said it outright, but I think all of us
preferred daylight for what we were about to do. We
met just after nine in the same gravel lot behind
the diner. Claire had the small wooden container with Ethan's
ashes tucked carefully into a bag. No one commented on it,
but everyone noticed. From there, we drove the rest of
the way out of town. The roads felt narrower than
I remembered. Houses that once seemed far apart were packed
closer together. Now a few new developments had crept out
toward the edge of the woods, but the forest itself
still loomed behind them the same way it always had, dark, dense,
and quiet. We parked near the old logging road. The
gravel path was still there, though we looked more overgrown
than before. Tall grass had swallowed most of the tire tracks,
and thin saplings leaned over the trail where trucks used
to pass. For a moment, none of us moved. Then
Marcus opened his door. Guess this is it, he said.
We stepped out into the morning air. It was cooler
beneath the trees, the sunlight breaking into thin strips through
the canopy. The smell of damp earth and pine needles
hung in the air, sharp and familiar. I hadn't been
back here in nearly twenty years, but my body recognized
it immediately. We followed the old road on foot, the
gravel crunching under our shoes. Sam walked ahead for a
while before stopping and turning around. Was it this way,
he asked. Marcus looked uncertain. I think so. The deeper
we went, the more wrong everything started to feel. The
woods seemed smaller. When we were kids, the place felt endless,
like you could walk for hours without seeing the same
tree twice. Now the forest felt tighter somehow, the spaces
between things shorter, the trails narrower. Branches scraped against each
other overhead in the breeze. Claire slow to a star.
I don't remember this part, she said. Marcus glanced at around. Yeah,
the trail shifted. He stepped off the main path, slightly,
scanning the trees. This used to open up somewhere around here.
Sam kicked to the ground. Great, he muttered, we're looking
for a random spot in the forest we haven't been
in since middle school. Marcus ignored him. Instead, he walked
a little further into the trees, pushing aside a low
branch as he moved. Then he stopped. Wait. The rest
of us followed. Marcus pointed a head through the trees.
You see those. At first I didn't understand what he meant.
Then I saw it. Three tall pines growing unusually close together,
the trunks twisting slightly around each other near the base.
Something about the sh shapes stirred a distant memory. Marcus
nodded slowly, Yeah, he said, that's it. Claire stepped forward.
Are you sure? Marcus moved toward the trees without answering.
We shaddered behind his curiosity. Just beyond them, the ground
dipped slightly, opening into a small clearing, no bigger than
a backyard. I stopped as soon as I saw it,
because even after all these years, I recognized the place immediately.
This is it, Marcus said quietly. No one disagreed. For
a moment, we stood there, taking it in. The clearing
looked smaller than I remembered, just like the rest of
the woods. The grass was patchy, thin in places where
sunlight struggled to reach each through the canopy, but the
center of the clearing was impossible to miss. The ground
was darker uneven. Claire stepped forward slowly. Was it always
like that? She asked? I shook my head. No. Marcus
crouched down near the center. He didn't even have to
brush the dirt away to see it. The soil was loose,
recently disturbed, like someone I'd been digging there not long ago.
Marcus stayed crouched near the center of the clearing, slowly
dragging his fingers through the loose earth like it was
testing it. It's fresh, he said, Sam frowned. Fresh how
Marcus lifted his hand. Dark soil clung to his fingertips.
This hasn't been like this for long. I stepped closer
now that I was standing over it. The shape of
the ground was obvious. Some one had dug here recently.
The earth was piled unevenly around the center, the way
dirt looks when it's been shoveled out and pushed aside
in a hurry. But the hole itself wasn't open anymore.
The middle had sunk inward, like whatever had been dug
out had collapsed back into itself. Claire noticed something first, wait,
she said. She walked a few steps to the side
of the clearing and bent down. When she stood back up,
she was holding an empty beer can. Ethan didn't drink,
Sam said automatically. Claire turned the can in her hand.
The metal was dirty and slightly dented. Someone did. Marcus
stood up and started looking around the edge of the clearing.
He didn't have to look long. Here, he said. Leaning
against one of the trees was a shovel, or what
was left of one. The wooden handle had snapped cleanly
in the middle, leaving the metal blade half buried in
the dirt where it had fallen. The pale wood inside
hadn't darkened yet. Sam walked over and picked up the
broken handle, turning it in his hands. So someone came
out here, dug a hole, broke a shovel, and just left,
he said. Marcus didn't answer. He had already stepped back
toward the center of the clearing. The shallow pit was
easier to see up close. Someone had definitely dug there.
The dirt around the edges had been thrown outward in
rough piles, and the middle had sunk into a dark
hollow with the soil that had collapsed inward, like the
ground had given way. After the digging stopped, Marcus crouched again.
Ethan was here, he said, quietly. No one argued. Sam
crossed his arms. Okay, he said, let's say he was there.
Still doesn't mean Marcus suddenly leaned forward. Wait, he brushed
the patch of dirt aside with his hand. Something black
was sticking out of the soil. At first I thought
it was a piece of plastic. Then Marcus pulled it free.
It was a phone. The screen was cracked and dirt
filled the edges of the case, but it was unmistakable.
Claire stepped closer. That's his, she said. Marcus turned it
over slowly in his hand. The phone was caged with
dried mud, like it had been dropped directly into the
hole while someone was digging, or while something else was happening.
Sam stared at it. You're telling me he just left
his phone out here. Marcus didn't answer. Instead, he pressed
the side button. For a moment. Nothing happened. Then the
screen flickered weakly to life. Marcus stared at the screen
for a moment. The phone had turned on, but the
battery icon flashing in the corner told the rest of
the story one percent. Then the screen went black again.
Sam exhaled through his nose. Great Marcus pressed the button again. Nothing,
it's dead, Claire said quietly. Marcus looked around the clearing,
then back down at the phone. Not necessarily, he reached
into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small power
bank with a charging cable wrapped around it. Sam gave
a short laugh. Of course you brought that, Marcus shrugged, habit.
He crouched again and brushed more dirt off the phone
before plugging the cable in. For a moment, nothing happened.
Then the screen lit faintly, a charging symbol appeared. Every
One leaned closer without meaning to. Marcus set the phone
carefully on the ground between us. Give it a minute,
he said. So we waited. The woods were quiet in
that strange way Forrest's get where the wind stops, not
silent exactly, just muted the occasional creak of and just
shifting somewhere deeper in the trees. A bird calling far
off in the distance, but the clearing itself felt strangely still.
Sam paced a few steps away, kicking at loose dirt.
This proves he was here, he said, that's all. Claire
didn't answer. Her eyes stayed fixed on the phone. Marcus
crouched beside it, arms resting on his knees. I noticed
he kept glancing at the shallow pit beside us, like
he was expecting something to change while we waited. I
tried not to look at it. After a few minutes,
the phone vibrated softly. The screen came fully to life.
Marcus picked it up and unlocked it. The lock screen
was cracked badly, but it still responded. He opened Ethan's files.
There weren't many recent ones, just a handful of photos
and one audio recording. The timestine showed it had been
made five nights ago. Marcus looked at us. This has
to be from when he was here. Sam crossed his
arms again. Then play it. Marcus hesitated for a second,
then he tapped the file. The recording started with a
soft rush of static, then the sound of dirt moving,
shoveling a metal blade scraping through soil. The rhythm was
an even as if Ethan had been digging quickly, then
stopping to catch his breath. For a while, the only
sounds were that and the forest around him. Heavy breathing,
dirt shifting, the dull thud of the shovel hitting something
harder beneath the surface. Claire's hand moved to a mouth
because we all recognized that sound. Marcus turned up the
volume slightly on the recording. Ethan stopped digging. There was
a pause, then his voice, breathless and excited. I found
it again, The four of us looked at each other.
The recording went quiet. For several seconds. There was nothing
except Ethan breathing into the phone microphone. Then something else,
a faint movement, a scraping sound under the dirt, like
something shifting beneath the ground. Sam frowned, what is that?
No one answered On the recording. Ethan moved closer to
whatever he'd uncover. His breathing grew louder, closer to the microphone.
Then he spoke again. His voice had changed lower, unsteady,
You remember us. The sentence made the clearing feel suddenly colder.
For a moment, there was nothing. Then the audio walked slightly,
like interference had passed through the microphone. A low vibration
hummed through the recording, and underneath it a voice so
faint it almost blended into the static. Marcus turned the
volume up all the way. The words were barely there, distorted,
but we could still make them out. You open the door,
Claire made a small sound beside me. The recording crackled sharply.
Then it stopped. For a few seconds. None of us moved.
Marcus was still holding the phone out in front of him,
like the audio might start playing again. If he waited
long enough, it didn't. The words felt different now. I
think it collectively dawned on us how far removed we
were from safety. Sam was the first to speak. There
could be anything, he said quickly. His voice sounded a
little too loud in the clearing audio. Glitches happen all
the time, phones to pick a weird background noise. No
one responded. Marcus slowly lowered the phone. You heard what
it said, he muttered. Sam shook his head. I heard
something that's handled words. Claire was staring at the shallow
pit again. What if we've been remembering this wrong the
whole time, she said, Sam sighed. Claire, no, listen. She
stepped closer to the disturbed ground. What if we didn't
find it? Sam frowned. What Claire looked back at us.
What if it found us? The question hung in the air.
Marcus slowly nodded, that's kind of what it felt like.
Sam looked between us like we'd all suddenly lost our minds.
You're seriously going to jump to that conclusion because of
a creepy voice recording. Marcus ignored him. I keep remembering something,
he said. He rubbed to the back of his neck
that day when we were digging, Claire turned toward him.
What Marcus looked down at the collapsed pit. Ethan leaned
into the hole. He was talking. You already told us that,
Sam said. Sam shifted uncomfortably, like he'd been holding something back.
All this unanswered energy was breaking him down and he
was at his breaking point. Sam hesitated, Then he said
something quieter, There's something I remember too. We all looked
at him. Sam stared at the ground while he spoke.
After we left the clearing, none of us interrupted. We
were all freaked out right, just trying to get back
to the bikes. Marcus nodded slightly, yeah, Sam continued, I
remember we were walking down the trail in a line,
Marcus in front, the rest of us behind him. That
leaves Ethan last, Claire said. Sam nodded, yeah. He looked
up at us and the whole way back. He paused.
Ethan didn't say a single word. Marcus frowned, so Sam
shook his head. You don't get it, He pointed back
toward the clearing behind us. That kid never shut up,
even when we were scared, even when we were running,
Ethan always had something to say. But that day he
just walked behind us the whole way home. Sam swallowed.
Claire crossed their arms. Does that mean anything? Sam looked
at her. Maybe, then he added quietly, but he felt different.
None of us asked him to explain what he meant,
because in that moment I realized something uncomfortable. I remembered
that feeling too. The four of us stood around the
shallow pit, the phone still in Marcus's hand, the broken
shovel lying half buried beside it. The clearing felt smaller
than it had a few minutes ago, like the trees
had leaned in a little closer without us noticing. Sam
kicked a loose clump of dirt into the hole. Look,
he said, his voice tight. Even if Ethan came back
here and dug this up again, that doesn't mean but
he didn't finish the sentence, because thing had been bothering
me since we listened to that recording, a small detail
that kept turning over in my head. I looked at
Marcus when Ethan leaned into the hole. I said, slowly,
you said he was talking. Marcus nodded yeah, and something
answered that's what I remember. I looked at the collapse
pit again. The loose soil, the broken shovel ethan digging
five nights ago, finding it again, A strange thought began
forming in the back of my mind. At first, it
felt ridiculous, the kind of idea you immediately push away
because it doesn't fit how the world is supposed to work.
But the more I tried to ignore it, the clearer
it became. Claire noticed the look on my face. What
is it? She asked. I hesitated, then I said it.
What if we've been thinking about this the wrong way?
Sam led out a tired breath. Please don't say something
like it's cursed or haunted, or what if we didn't
just find something buried? I said, That got his attention.
Sam frowned, What do you mean? I gestured to what
the whole We always talked about it, like we dug
something up, like we uncovered something that was already there.
Marcus was watching me closely, and he asked, I swallowed.
What if that's not what happened. The words felt strange
even as I said them. What if we opened something instead?
Claire's expression shifted. You mean like a container? I shook
my head slowly. No, something colder than the morning air
moved through me. As the thought finally locked into place,
like a door. No one laughed, no one even argued,
because we had all heard the same words on Ethan's recording.
You opened the door. Sam stared at the pit. That's
not But he stopped again because suddenly something else made sense,
something Marcus had said earlier. Ethan leaning down into the hole,
listening and talking. Marcus spoke quietly. If it was a door,
I finished the thought for him, then something could have
come through. The clearing fell silent again. Sam shook his head,
but the movement looked weak. That's insane, is it, Claire asked.
She nodded to other phone, still in Marcus's hand. We
heard something talking. Sam didn't answer. Marcus looked down at
the disturbed earth. Ethan kept coming back here, he said,
over and over. Claire hugged her arms around herself. Maybe
he remembered something we didn't. A memory surfaced suddenly in
my mind of the way Ethan had stayed behind us
the whole time. Quiet. I felt a slow creeping realization
settle over me. We had opened something, and whatever had
been inside hadn't stayed there. It had followed us out
of the woods, followed us all the way back to town,
but not with all of us, just one. I looked
at the others and finally said the thing none of
us had considered before. It didn't stay in the ground,
I said. My voice sounded distant in my own ears.
It came with us. Claire's eyes widened. Marcus went very still.
Sam whispered, what are you saying. I looked down at
the pit, then back toward the trail that led out
of the woods, toward the life Ethan had lived for
the past twenty years. We let something out, I said.
No one spoke, because of the rest of the thought
had already reached all of us at the same time.
It hadn't followed Marcus or Claire, Sam or me. It
had chosen some one else, some one who had leaned
down into the hole, some one who had spoken back Ethan.
The idea sat there between us, heavy and impossible to
move around. Sam shook his head slowly. No, he said,
under his breath. No, that still doesn't explain why he
he stopped. Margus looked up. Why he what? Sam gestured
vaguely toward the town behind the trees, Why he killed himself?
The words sounded wrong. The moment, he said it because suddenly,
looking at the disturbed earth in front of us, it
didn't fit any more. Claire said it first, very quietly,
What if he didn't? Sam frowned what Claire nodded toward
the pit. He came back here. Marcus glanced at the
broken shovel, the empty beer cans, the phone buried in
the dirt. Then he looked at the hall again. Understanding
crept slowly across his face. Oh, he said. My stomach
dropped because the same thought had already hit me. Ethan
hadn't come out here, to remember, he had come back
for one reason, to finish something. I logged at the
collapsed pit, the ground that had been dug open and
then closed again, like someone had tried to force it shut.
The realization landed all at once. Ethan hadn't killed himself.
He had come back to the woods, back to the
place where we opened it, to put it back. Sam
finally broke the silence. So that's it, he said, He
just came out here and tried to bury it again.
Marcus didn't answer. Claire slumped his shoulders and defeat. It
doesn't make sense, she said, quietly, What doesn't Sam asked
if it attached to him. She said, why come back
here at all? No one had an answer to that.
We'd come to a logical dead end, having exhausted all
our testimony and found evidence with barely a word. We'd
decided to head back to somehow process all this in
future therapy sessions. We'd almost reached the edge of the
clearing when all four of our phones vibrated at the
same time. The sound was so sudden it made Claire jump.
Sam pulled his phone out first. What there? Marcus was
already looking at his screen. I checked mine. We had
awe received the same message from Ethan. For a moment,
none of us moved. The timestamp said the message had
been sent five nights ago, but the delivery notification just
read now. Marcus looked back toward the trees behind us.
No signal in the clearing, he said slowly. Claire nodded.
Once we started walking, the message had finally gone through.
Sam stared at the screen. It's a video. Marcus took
a moment for resolve and just said put it on.
Sam opened the message and turned the phone so we
could all see. The video started shaky and dark. For
a moment, It was just Ethan's flashlight being moving across
the trees he was walking. You could hear leaves crunching
under his shoes and his breathing in the microphone. Then
he flipped the camera around. Ethan looked older than when
I'd last seen him, thinner, His eyes looked tired. But
there was something else there too. Relief. Hey, he said
to the camera. His voice sounded hoarse. If you're watching this,
it means I finally figured it out. He glanced over
his shoulder into the trees behind him, before continuing, I
know you guys probably think I've been losing it for
the last few months. A faint smile crossed his Honestly,
I thought so too for a while. He walked a
few more steps before stopping. The beam of his flashlight
tilted downward dirt the edge of a hole, the same
clearing we were just standing in. But Ethan looked back
into the camera. It took me twenty years, he said,
but I finally understand what we found that day. He hesitated,
then shook his head. Actually, that's the first mistake. We
didn't find it. His voice dropped slightly. It found us.
The woods were silent around us as we watched. Ethan continued,
It doesn't move, not really. It doesn't crawl out of
the ground or chase people through the woods or anything
like that. He looked down at the hole again. It
spreads through memory. A slow chill ran through me. Ethan
ran a hand through his hair. The day we dug
that thing up, we all saw it. That's how it attaches.
He looked back at the camera, seeing it is enough.
Sam shifted beside me, but none of us looked away.
Ethan continued. The difference is you guys stopped thinking about it.
You buried it. His expression tightened slightly. I couldn't. He
glanced toward the woods again, like he expected something to
be standing there listening. That's why it stuck with me.
Then Ethan said something that made my stomach draw, And
that's why I kept messaging you. Marcus whispered Jeez on
the video. Ethan nodded slightly like he could hear him.
I wasn't trying to catch up, he said, I was
testing something. He took a slow breath. I needed to
know if you still remembered the flashlight beam shifted as
he moved the camera slightly. You see it gets stronger
when people remember it together, every time someone thinks about it,
every time someone talks about it. He gave a tired laugh.
So every message I sent you, every time we tried
to remember what happened that day, he shook his head.
We were feeding it. No one spoke. The video continued
to play in the quiet woods. Ethan looked straight into
the camera. Now that's the real problem. It doesn't want
out of the ground. He gestured toward the hole behind him.
It wants out of us. On the screen, Ethan turned
the camera slightly, angling it toward the hole behind him.
The beam of the flashlight lit the disturbed earth, the
same patch of ground we were standing beside now. For
a while, he said, I thought the only way to
stop it was to forget. He let out a quiet breath.
But that's not how it works. The camera shifted as
he crouched near the edge of the pit. I tried,
he continued, I stopped coming out here. I stopped thinking
about it. He gave a small, humorless smile. But it
didn't stop thinking about me. None of us moved. As
the video played. Ethan brushed dirt away with a side
of his hand. I kept hearing it again, he said
in my dreams. When I was awake, his voice had
gone lower, calling. He looked back into the camera, and
then I realized something. A flashlight beam dipped toward the
ground again. It's tied to this place, the hole. He
gestured toward the disturbed soil. As long as this spot exists,
the memory is somewhere to live. So it came back
to finish it. He reached behind him and grabbed the
shovel lying in the dirt. The metal edge scraped against
the ground as he dragged it closer. I'm going to
dig it up again, he said. Everything. Then he nodded
towards something off camera, and I brought in a fuel
to burn the rest. Claire sucked in a quiet breath
beside me. Ethan looked back at the camera one last time.
If the place is gone, the memory won't have anything
to attach to. The video jolted as he set the
phone down on the ground nearby. The camera angled tilted sideways,
showing the edge of the pit and the dark outline
of the trees beyond it. Then he started digging shovel,
biting into dirt soil, shifting heavy breathing between each movement.
For nearly a minute, no one spoke in the video.
Ethan just kept digging. Then the shovel struck something. A dull,
hollow clang echoed through the phone speaker. Ethan froze on
the video. He leaned forward, slightly, peering down into the hole.
His breathing had slowed. I can hear it again, he
said quietly. A faint distortion flickered through the audio. At
first it sounded like wind brushing against the microphone, then
something else. Her voice so quiet it almost blended into
the static. The words were impossible to fully make out,
just a low whisper under the noise. Ethan's shoulders shifted.
Then he shook his head sharply. No, he said. The
whisper continued. Lean closer to the hole. You don't get them,
only me, he said firmly. For a second, the camera
picked up a deeper vibration in the audio. Then the
video cut to black. Tom's phone was still held out
between us, the dark screen reflecting our faces back faintly.
The woods around us felt unnaturally still, like everything had
paused to let the lasting. Ethan said, settle in. Marcus
was the first look away. He stepped forward slowly back
to the clearing, the dry leaves under his shoes crunching
louder than they should have. His eyes drifted back toward
the claps pit in the middle of the clearing. When
he reached the edge of the hole, he crouched down again.
The broken shovel blade was still lying there where we'd
found it earlier. Marcus picked it up. For a second.
He just held it, staring into the loose dirt. Then
he started digging, like he already knew what he was
going to find and didn't want to rush getting there.
The metal edge scraped against the soil as he pulled
it back toward himself. Dirt shifted and slid inward with
the ground that collapsed earlier. Sam watched for a moment
before finally saying Marcus. But Marcus kept going. Another shallow
scoop of dirt pushed aside. The rest of us moved
closer without meaning to. After a few seconds, the color
of the soil started to change. At first, I thought
it was just a lighting under the trees. Then Marcus
paused and brushed the dirt to side with his hand.
The ground beneath it was darker, almost black, charred. Marcus
wiped his palm against his jeans and dug again, pushing
more of the loose soil away. The smell hit a
second later, faint but unmistakable, burnt wood. Claire stepped closer. Oh,
she whispered. Under the thin layer of fresh dirt, the
ground was completely blackened, like it had been scorched. Pieces
of something brittle and dark broke apart as the shovel
edge touched them, burnt wood fragments. Sam crouched beside him.
Now geez, he muttered. Marcus uncovered another section, something metallic,
called the Light. He pulled it free from the soil.
The metal was twisted and warped, blackened by heat. The
edges curled in strange directions, like it had melted and
hardened again. Marcus stared down at it for a long
moment before slowly setting it aside. Then he brushed more
dirt away with his hand. Everywhere beneath the loose earth
was the same black soil, burned debris, ash worked deep
into the ground. It wasn't the kind of damage you
get from a small fire. Whatever Ethan had done here,
it had burned hot enough to scar the earth itself.
Claire's voice came quietly behind us. He didn't just dig
it up. Marcus shook his head slowly. No. He looked
down into the pit again and the charred soil, at
the frag of whatever had once been buried here. Standing
there in the clearing, looking down at the blackened ground
where something terrible it once lived, I realized something that
made my chest tighten. Ethan hadn't been trying to prove
we were wrong. He had been trying to save us.
Marcus was still kneeling at the edge of the pit,
the broken shovel blade resting beside him. The charred earth
beneath the dirt looked darker now that we'd uncovered more
of it, Like the ground itself had been permanently stained.
Claire stepped forward quietly. She reached into her bag and
pulled out the small wooden container. For a second, she
just held it there, turning it slightly in her hands.
No one asked what she was doing. She opened it,
a thin gray dust shifted inside Ethan. Claire walked to
the edge of the pit. She didn't say anything, no
speech or good bye. She simply tilted the container forward.
The ashes drifted down into the black and soil, disappearing
into the same burnt earth Ethan had carved open a
few nights earlier. Marcus lowered his head slightly. It felt
less like a funeral and more like finishing something Ethan
had started. The ashes had settled into the black and soil,
blending with the charred earth until there was no clear
line between them. The clearing looked ordinary again now that
the digging had stopped, just another patch of dirt beneath
the trees. Eventually, Marcus stood up. Guess that's Sam started,
but the sentence faded out before he finished it. We
turned toward the trail. Marcus took a few steps, then stopped. Wait.
We all looked back at him. He was staring at
the pit again, his brow furrowed, like he just remembered
something important. What did it look like, he asked. Claire
tilted her head. What that thing, Marcus said, gesturing vaguely
toward the hole, The thing we dug off. Sam opened
his mouth, then paused. I tried to picture it, the
object under the dirt, the shape bed uncovered when we
were twelve, the thing Ethan had spent twenty years thinking about.
But the harder I tried to focus on it, the
more the details slipped away. I Sam frowned, I don't remember.
Claire crossed her arms, staring into the pit. It was
something she said slowly metal. Marcus asked, or would, Sam said.
Claire looked at her and no, that's not right. None
of us could explain why the shape was gone. The sound, too,
even the voice we just heard on Ethan's recording, felt
distant now, like a dream. You can only recall the
feeling of something had happened here once, something bad, but
the details had already started to dissolve. Marcus looked down
at the burnt ground one last time. Then he noted slightly,
like he just accepted something. We left the clearing. The
walk back through the woods felt shorter than it had
that morning. None of us talked much. There wasn't really
anything to say about. Halfway down the trail, a strange
thought crossed my mind. I couldn't remember why we'd come
out here. I remember the funeral, I remembered meeting at
the diner afterward. I remembered Claire bringing Ethan's ashes. But
the reason we had walked all the way into the woods.
That part felt blurry now, like a story someone had
told me once that I couldn't quite recall. Ahead of us,
the trees began to thin, the old logging road appeared
between them, and our cars waited where we'd left them.
By the time we reached them, the woods were just
the woods again, and whatever Ethan had saved us from,
none of us could remember it any more.