A Flash Fiction Story
The fire was dying.
James poked at the embers with a stick, watching as the last hints of orange flickered against the deep black of the night. He should add more wood, but the pile beside him was small, and the forest was too quiet to risk stepping beyond the glow.
A full moon hung above the trees, casting pale silver light over the clearing. Snow stretched in every direction, untouched except for his footprints leading back to the cabin—a place that had once been home. Now, it was just walls, a roof, and memories he couldn’t carry.
He pulled his coat tighter around him. The wind had died hours ago, leaving only a thick, pressing silence behind. Somewhere in the distance, the lake lay frozen, a sheet of ice that hid the water’s depths.
The same lake where Evelyn had disappeared.
James exhaled, watching his breath curl in the cold. He had come back because he had nowhere else to go. The world had moved on without him, but the cabin, the lake, the trees—they had stayed the same.
Something cracked in the woods.
He tensed, his fingers tightening around the stick. The fire was burning too low now, its warmth barely reaching him. His mind told him it was just the cold, the trees shifting in the night. But something deeper, something instinctual, whispered otherwise.
He wasn’t alone.
The wind picked up again, sudden and sharp, stirring the trees. Snowflakes swirled, and for a moment, he thought he saw movement at the edge of the clearing.
A shadow.
Tall. Still. Watching.
His pulse pounded. He blinked, and it was gone.
Just the trees. Just the night playing tricks.
James forced himself to breathe. He looked at the pile of wood again, knowing he needed to feed the fire. Letting it go out was not an option.
Not tonight.
The fire had almost burned to embers when he finally moved. His hands were stiff from the cold, his knees aching as he stood. He grabbed a log and fed it to the flames, watching as the fire sputtered, struggled—then caught.
The light stretched out, pushing back the dark.
And that was when he saw them.
Footprints.
Not his own.
They trailed from the edge of the clearing toward him—but never away.
James stared, his breath frozen in his throat. He hadn’t heard anything. Hadn’t seen anything. Yet the prints were there, pressed deep into the snow.
Coming closer.
A gust of wind howled through the trees, and the fire flickered low for a moment. The shadows danced.
And she was standing there.
Evelyn.
His chest tightened. It wasn’t possible. He had searched for days. Weeks. He screamed her name into the trees until his voice had gone out. She had vanished beneath the ice.
He had seen the hole.
He had seen the lake swallow her whole.
But now, she was here.
Pale. Silent. Her hair dark against the snow, her eyes fixed on him with something unreadable. Not quite sadness. Not quite anger.
Just waiting.
The fire flared, sending sparks into the sky, and she took a step closer.
James stumbled back, nearly falling into the pit. His mind screamed that it wasn’t real, that it couldn’t be real. But the footprints—the footprints were real.
“Evelyn?” His voice cracked, barely a whisper.
She didn’t answer.
Didn’t move.
Just stood at the edge of the light.
James' body trembled. His breath came fast, shallow, but he couldn’t move—wouldn’t move. If he did, if he blinked, she might disappear again.
Or worse, she might not.
The fire hissed, the log collapsing into embers. The shadows grew. The wind carried something soft, almost like a whisper.
"Come back."
His knees nearly gave out. He gripped the edge of the fire pit for support. “I—I tried,” he choked. “I looked for you. I swear, I looked.”
The wind pressed harder, biting through his coat, wrapping around him like unseen hands.
The lake.
He knew where she wanted him to go.
But she was gone. Had been for years.
Wasn’t she?
The fire burned lower, the darkness pressing in.
"Come back."
James took a step forward.
The snow crunched beneath his boot. The cold no longer felt so sharp. His breath slowed.
The fire flickered.
And the footprints beside him?
They led away.
Toward the lake.
He took another step.
And another.
And as the fire finally died, as the last ember turned to ash, the night swallowed him whole.
Just like it had her.
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