New year’s eve.

Cheerful melodies played softly through his car’s radio ‘’It’s the most wonderful time of the year, with kids jingle belling, and everyone telling you to be of a good cheer. It’s the most wonderful time of the year. ’’

The sweet voice of a singer he didn’t recognize made his skin prickle with goosebumps raising at the base of his neck. He instinctively ignored them. The luminating moonlight made his drive through the wood a bit easier, less scary in fact. He was trying to convince his subconscious that he’ll get back home safely after being held back late because of a stupid night shift on new year’s eve since we all know how crowded malls can be at this time of the year.

The humming of the car’s engine swallowed the melodies along the way. Getting strangely thicker and abnormally paranoiac, he ignored it for a while, telling himself that all of that is in his head is just the outcome of a tiring consuming week. And as was as graciously predicted the car came to a halt in the middle of nowhere. Well that’s the understatement of the year. It stopped in the middle of possibly the most deserted area of the town, where reportedly numerous people went missing, never to be found, evaporated, vanished. ‘Great’ he said to himself in a sarcastic tone pathetically attempting to calm his panic and just blame it on bad luck. His mouth got drier, slightly , but dry enough to make him lock himself in his car and not even dare to check what went wrong with it. He checked his phone but there was no service, shocking.

He felt the urge to just stay locked in his car to God knows when, but that’s not gonna do him any good. No cars pass by here, and much less to say the panic is starting to rise again in his chest. Debating whether to just stay that way or risk having a heart attack because of an owl or a howling wolf, he quitely opened his door and stepped out of the vehicle grabbing his phone over his head desperately trying to catch a signal. His heartbeat progressivly quickening, he slowly paced around the car not daring to get far from it, but there was no use. Maybe he needed to get to a higher point. Maybe that was the only logical way to get him out this petrifying place.

Taking cautious steps as if he was afraid of waking something up, he got further away from his car praying and suppressing his fears. He heard the crack of a dry branch but he thought that that was just his imagination messing around with him. He ignored it nevertheless. With every step he took his fears resurface trying to consume him. This time he heard the same voice, but louder, and he was sure that it was for real; he was not on his own like he thought. He tried to be as silent as possible without much of a choice but wait for the stupid signal to come up.

His eyes darted from side to side with no good view. The sky was practically blacked out. Even though the moon was full, the scene was pitch black. He was lucky he didn’t run into a tree.
In the middle of all his jumbled thoughts, a tiny happy giggle was heard. His eyes widened and his heart beat was so fast to the point of near explosion. He could barely catch his breath and his thick shirt was drenched in sweat. Another happy louder giggle escaped again. The sound was much closer. He was hoping silently for it to turn out to be some sort of mind games his tiredness and exhaustion caused.

But hazy shadows crept between the trees’ old branches. ‘’Hello ! Is anybody there ?’’ he scream-whispered hoping that it be someone who lived nearby and came to help him when his broke-down car was seen, but that was highly unlikely. The screeching sound of nails and the dry branches of trees being broken confirmed the fact that he has to be ready for what’s coming next. He wasn’t sure what was he supposed to be afraid of.

The wind howled and blew a bitter chill past the dying trees. It danced with the leaves and dragged them away unwillingly from the winter ground. The forest seemed endless; tall silhouettes shadowing the damp and stangnant floor with the decomposing wood, ravens circling overhead and screams filled with agony mixed with happy laughter echoing through the wind. Beady eyes scanned the area. A paranormal presence lurked in the essence of the devil’s grasp, shadowing each living or decaying organism with dire precision.

The poor widow couldn’t mourn her husband’s death, or better to say her husband’s soul disappearance.
He was found three days later, by a hicker. It was reported that his body held no wounds, no bruises nor cuts. It was barely touched. He had the same clothes he wore the day he vanished and his right hand was holding his phone tight. He didn’t even have any decomposing sign, a neat corpse with no signs of struggle nor fight.