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“Good God, could I be any stupider?” Alexandra looked around in a state of barely-suppressed panic at the anonymous woods that loomed around her. She no longer had any idea whatsoever of where her car was; the light of a nearly-full moon had seemed enough to guide her steps through the thickly-wooded area back to the town, but somehow, she had managed to thoroughly lose herself in the black-green depths. Right, great idea, talking out loud where the wild animals can hear you, she thought, staggering to a stop on the clinging, draping underbrush of the forest as she thought she heard something like movement. Alexandra turned in a slow circle, thinking fretfully that even if she wanted to get back to her broken-down car, she wasn’t likely to be able to retrace her steps.
It had seemed so straightforward when she had left home that afternoon; Alexandra found an uprooted tree in the silver-tinged light of the moon and sank down on it, sighing. She had decided that instead of paying the obscene rate for a train ticket, she would just drive. Her car was only a few years younger than she was—but it had been behaving itself well, and it wasn’t as though the drive was across state lines. Alexandra had noticed the old Volvo beginning to run a little hot in the stop-and-go traffic a few towns back; but she had hoped when she stopped for dinner that the cool-off time would help it get through the trek.
She had a job interview in two days’ time; she had already called ahead to the hotel to let them know that she was running late, but Alexandra was now feeling as though the possibilities of even getting there were completely hopeless. The car had overheated right in the midst of the woods, just a mile or two south of the closest town. While Alex had not been exactly thrilled at the idea of walking two miles or more to get to the nearest gas station—and therefore arrange a meeting with a roadside assistance guy—she had decided that there was nothing else for it, and that she would rather not spend the rest of the night locked in her car in the middle of nowhere.
Alexandra shivered in the slight chill of the air as the light breeze dried the sweat on her arms and legs. The woods looked—and felt—so very forbidding. Every few moments, it seemed, there was the sound of something moving, and in the distance, she had heard the unmistakable howls of a pack of wolves. As she sat, attempting to figure out what she should do next, Alexandra heard the sounds of the forest around her starting to rise up a little more: creaky chirps and buzzing of bugs, an inquiring hoot from an owl—and in the distance an air-splitting shriek from another nocturnal bird. She swallowed against the tight dryness in her throat, looking around in the gloomy, pale light. If I tried to get back to my car, I’d probably only get even more hopelessly lost, Alexandra thought bitterly. But if I keep going forward, I’m only going to get more lost, too. Congrats, ‘Lex. Your options are: lost or lost. She hugged herself, trying to find something—anything—she could use as a landmark.
Alexandra’s throat tightened again, and she felt her eyes stinging as tears began to form, rolling down her cheeks. She was scared, alone, and tired; and though she hated—hated—to cry, at least there would be no one there in the woods to hear or see her doing it. She hugged her knees, slipping down the slightly slick surface of the downed log onto the ground and began to cry in earnest. All this because I’m too broke for a fucking train ticket, she thought bitterly.
Her sobs were interrupted by another howl, and Alexandra gulped. “Oh my God,” she whispered, uncurling her body. Her heart beat faster in her chest; that howl had been much, much closer than the previous ones she had heard. As if to confirm her suspicion, she heard yips, growls, and movement—only a dozen yards away at most.
All at once, Alexandra was on her feet, her worry about her job prospects and the broken-down car evaporating in the face of a much more important concern. She lurched into a run, not even certain of where she was going, only completely sure that she needed to do whatever she could to put distance between herself and the wolf pack. They may not have been hunting her specifically; but that would not stop them from reacting to her presence—and her fear—if they stumbled across her. For a few moments, relief flooded through Alexandra; maybe she would be able to get sufficiently far away that the wolves would go after something else. Maybe the wolves hadn’t noticed her at all. Maybe she would find a tree she could climb to keep away from the pack, long enough for them to lose interest.
Her feet caught on the tough, hard-barked roots of something—one of the huge, towering trees, Alexandra thought—and she tumbled down onto the ground in a heap, unable to check her forward momentum or even cushion her fall. All of the air in her lungs left in a fast whooping noise and Alexandra’s heart beat even faster as she struggled to regain some oxygen. In the next instant, pain flared up along her sides, and down somewhere below her knee, a shockwave echoing the sharp prod from her elbow to her shoulder. Get up! Get up! Get up or you’ll be dog food, woman! Alexandra grabbed weakly at the slippery, pungent branches of a bush, but to no avail. She could hear the soft, crunching movements of the wolf pack and let out a low, breathless groan of dread.