But as we pull up to the hills of dirt blocking the road, his grin fades a little. “Whoa.”
I’d expected pretty big piles. Tall enough to discourage people from trying to climb them in trucks or ATVs, but not so high as to make it impossible. But these hills tower over the truck, nearly eight feet high, and steep. Not only that, there are branches, pine straw, and all shapes and sizes of rocks mixed with the dirt, making the mounds seem dangerously unstable.
“Oh, bummer,” I say, hoping I sound legitimately regretful. “Those are way higher than I thought they’d be.”
It’s 10:32, and I’m suddenly annoyed. It’ll take us another twenty minutes to get out of here, then who knows how long to find somewhere else to go? And Linds’s house is on the other side of town, so that’s ten more. . . . At this rate, Kelley and I will have time to maybe shake hands.
“Oh ye of little faith,” Kelley says, waggling his eyebrows.
By now, all I want to do is get the heck out of this spooky forest and go somewhere normal to make out. Like a parking lot or a cul-de-sac. Any place that doesn’t give me a major case of the creepies. And if he thinks I’m climbing up giant mounds of packed clay and dirt . . .
“There’s no way we can get over these things,” I tell him, hoping that whatever his plan is, he’ll drop it.
Kelley grabs the gearshift, and I expect him to put it in reverse. Instead, he pulls the handle all the way down. The truck makes a grinding sound as it starts up one of the dirt hills, the cab rocking alarmingly from side to side. I grip the door handle. “What are you doing?”
“Four-wheel drive,” he tells me. “One of the few awesome things about driving this redneckmobile.”
The tires spin. For one brief, sickening moment, I feel them lose contact, and all I can see is the truck rolling down the hill, crushing me and Kelley in the wreckage. And they won’t find our bodies for forever because no one knows where we are, and when they do find us, everyone will know that I was cheating on Justin with Kelley Hamilton, even though I haven’t even gotten to the cheating part yet.
I look over at Kelley. He’s gritting his teeth, hands tight on the steering wheel.
But then the tires touch the dirt again, and suddenly, we’re cresting the top of the hill. Juddering and bouncing, the truck makes its way down the other side, and when we finally come to a rest at the bottom, Kelley kills the engine.
The lights are still on, illuminating an overgrown road that should really be called a path. It winds its way through the trees, disappearing around a bend a few yards in. I’m shaking, with both fear at nearly getting killed and the elation of not getting killed.
Next to me, Kelley starts to laugh, a relieved and kind of breathless sound. And then I start giggling, too. Our eyes meet, his reflecting the blue lights of the dash. He reaches out, cups my cheek in one palm, and then I’m unbuckling my seat belt and sliding across the bench seat and into his arms.
Once his lips are on mine, I’m not scared anymore. I can’t feel anything but want and heat. Kissing Kelley Hamilton is better than I’d thought it would be, and trust me, I’d thought it would be pretty amazing. But my daydreams didn’t capture how soft his hair is, or the low sound he makes in his throat as he holds me tighter. When we break apart for air, he presses his forehead against mine.
“I’ve wanted to do that for a really long time,” he breathes.
“Me too,” I confess, just as shakily.
Kelley kisses me again, softer this time, his hands cold on my lower back. He pulls away, fingers still sliding over my spine, making me shiver. “You know, we don’t have to go down to the bridge. I feel pretty good about staying right here.”
My face is pressed against his neck, so I know he can feel me smile. “I’m actually good with that.”
I lift my head and he sinks one hand into my hair as we move toward each other. But before we kiss, Kelley freezes, his head jerking to one side as he stares out the windshield. “What was that?”
Irritated, I slide back. “Don’t do that.”
His eyes flick to my face for a second before turning back to the woods. “No, I’m not being a dick. I saw something. Like, for real. Lights or something.”
Kelley turns the key, and with a click, the headlights go out, plunging us into darkness. “Just watch,” he tells me. “Over there, to the right.”
I cross my arms as I settle back into the passenger seat, squinting out into the darkness. “I don’t—” I say, but then, suddenly, I do.
They’re dim, but several yards away, twin orbs of red light are glowing faintly. They’re maybe the size of quarters, and as I watch, they disappear for a second, only to then reappear in exactly the same place.
“They look like—”
“Eyes,” Kelley finishes. “They look like eyes.”
Goose bumps prickle my arms. “Shut up,” I tell him, but I’m still staring out in the darkness. God, he’s right, they do look like eyes. They vanish again for a second, but just like before, they come back almost immediately.
“See?” Kelley points at the lights. “They’re blinking. What the hell has eyes like that?”
There are all kinds of creatures in these woods. Possums, raccoons . . . my mom even thought she saw a mountain lion out here when she was a teenager. So my brain races, trying to match those glowing circles to one of those animals. But none of them seem to fit. These eyes are too big to belong to a possum or a raccoon; they’re too red.
Still, I tell Kelley, “Probably just a trick of the light.”
I wait for him to let it go and to pull me back to him. Instead, he leans over the steering wheel, peering out. “But seriously, Sam, what is that thing? I mean, what has eyes like that?”
The mood is now sufficiently broken, and I can’t keep the poutiness out of my voice as I say, “Who cares? Let’s just get out of here. I promised Linds I’d be back by eleven thirty.”
This time, there’s no mistaking the annoyance on Kelley’s face. “Sam—” he starts, but before he can say anything else, this . . . sound fills the air. Part howl, part shriek, it’s like nothing I’ve ever heard before. Now the goose bumps aren’t just on my arms, they’re everywhere. The howl fades away, dissolving into a kind of chittering. I push the LOCK button on my door even though it’s already locked.
It’s just an animal. Some weird kind of animal that makes a weird, awful sound. My mind balks at calling it anything else. Still, I fasten my seat belt and tell Kelley, “I want to go. Now.”
But instead of starting the engine, Kelley grabs the door handle.
I grab him. “What are you doing?”
Still watching the darkness, he shakes off my grip. “I just want to get a closer look.”
All I can do is stare at him. “What?”
“Whatever it is, it’s weird, okay? So I want to see it.”
“You know what else is weird?” I say, already reaching down for my phone. “Getting your face eaten off by some chupacabra in the woods. Woods we are not even supposed to be in. Now let’s just forget it and go.”
My fingers close around my phone. If he won’t take me out of here, I’ll call someone. Linds. Heck, even my parents. Getting in trouble with them seems way less scary than getting mauled by a monster.
Kelley laughs. “A chupacabra?”
“You know, those monsters people see in Mexico, Texas, places like that,” I say, suddenly self-conscious. “They kill goats and cows.”