The man and the hatchet
“My stepmom (we’re going to call her Macy) grew up as a kind of a privileged teen in the 70’s and her mom had moved their family over here (the states) from England when she was about 9. She went to a pretty nice high school in a really nice town. There, she made friends with a girl (“Lily”) who didn’t exactly run with Macy’s type of crowd (popular, stereotypical, etc.) They really hit it off, and Lily would take Macy out to do her type of stuff: hiking, fishing, sailing (there’s even a hilarious set of pictures of them camping. My stepmom has raccoon eyes and looks like she hates everything.) Anyways, because of Lily’s influence, the two of them would do stuff like that a good amount.
One Sunday they decided to go hike in some hills about an hour away. Macy put on what I’m sure were her extremely expensive hiking shoes and the two of them drove off to the hiking trails. Lily parked in this big clearing with makeshift parking spots (you know, like a piece of wood marking the head of a space) but there were no other cars there. This was only important in hindsight.
They started hiking up the hill, off the path because Lily fancied herself as something of a badass. The hike was nothing extraordinary (if you asked my stepmom she would just lament for fifteen minutes how sticky and buggy it was.) Anyways, they reached the top of the hill and my stepmom was done. The polished, pampered side of her was coming out and she groaned until Lily (begrudgingly) said ok, they would rest and then walk down again, slower.
They had been heading down the hill for maybe ten minutes when Macy started bitching again. Lily conceded to walking down the side of the road instead of the rough hiking trail. So there they are, probably looking like a couple of tools geared up for hiking and walking down a crappy road, and after not even five minutes, a truck pulled up next to them.
It was red and rusty, and just generally looked like a clunker. The guy driving rolled down the window and the girls looked in through the passenger’s side window. He had a big beard, a baseball cap pulled down, and long brown hair. He greeted them and even smiled through his beard, asking if they needed a ride. Macy described him as charming, and even cute. Lily still says the moment he greeted them her hackles went up. Despite her better judgment, my stepmom convinced her to get in the truck. “It must only be a ten minute drive down to the car, tops.”
The two girls opened the passenger’s door to this rusty old thing, and the guy directed them behind the seat to get into the back. They settled in and the truck started rumbling forwards. Lily always says that was the point it hit her what a mistake they had just made. The backseat was clean enough but there was a rope on the floor behind the drivers seat and four boxes of saran wrap half hanging out from under the passenger’s seat. It seemed creepy and weird, but Lily didn’t want to freak my stepmom out so she just kept her mouth shut.
After ten minutes, the woods didn’t look any clearer, and they hadn’t seen another car the whole time. Lily asked how long he thought it would be. He said he was taking a different route down the hill and had to stop somewhere to get something first. That was it. The girls were 16/17, and Lily didn’t want to press the issue. She was scared. She can remember his hair because she was sitting behind him. He looked like a woodsy guy, but his hair was super tangled and dirty. She noticed crusted mud on his collar and tried to find something identifiable about him, but just got scared the more she picked up on little details. He was young-ish, strong looking, and had a 1’ on both of them. So they didn’t ask any more questions, and he didn’t offer any information, and they drove on.
Several minutes after that, they reached a tiny shack/log cabin looking place right there in a clearing of trees. There was an old stump where someone had been chopping wood and a huge axe stuck into the log. Lily was definitely on red alert now. The guy turned off the truck and slipped out of it, saying, “I’ll be right back. Don’t get out.” And he disappeared into the house.
