I immediately pulled the curtain closed.

“Please be my imagination.” I whispered to myself, even though I could still see the ‘blackness’ behind the window. “Please be nothing.”

I was still clutching the trophy as I yanked open the curtain once more.

The wendigo-creature had apparently shifted. Now the top of its head was pressed against the bars of the window like a little kid staring through a window of a candy shop. Every single eye was open and fixated on me.

So, I did the only sensible thing. I calmly closed the curtain once more before setting the trophy on the bed. I turned and walked out of the room with a regular walk. Then I closed the door and just stood there.

Rowan managed to twist to look at me. Their new position looked incredibly uncomfortable, but it barely crossed my mind as I considered what was on the other side of the bedroom door. All I could think of was the fact that the thing had followed me. It had stalked me all the way from the highway, through the forest, and now to my apartment.

“Something wrong?” Rowan asked.

“Nope. Nothing at all.” I said while I did my perfect impression of calmness. I was trying my hardest not to freak out any worse than I already was.

A whine came from the bedroom.

“You have… a dog…?”

“No. I have a problem.” Came my response.

Rowan quirked an eyebrow but remained silent, as if they were trying to prompt me to speak.

“So… Uh…” The quietness worked, so I began to explain. “I encountered a… thing while traveling. It’s huge. Lots of eyes, four arms, about the size of T-Rex.”

Rowan’s eyes began getting wider as I spoke. Especially when that whining noise from the bedroom got even louder.

“It ate things.” I decided to leave “classmate” and “hare-monster” as things, so I did not have to remember those moments too much. Just enough to tell this story. Otherwise, I probably would have started losing my mind. “And followed me into the woods.”

“Wait…” Rowan’s raspy voice had the faintest tinge of surprise. “You… were in… the forest?”

“Yeah?”

“Like… forest by Highway?”

“Yeeeah?”

“How… not dead?” Rowan’s expression was somewhere between awe and respect. Perhaps even a little concerned.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked, jerking back in confusion before quickly shaking my head. “Forget the forest. You’re missing the point. There is a giant ass monster looking in my bedroom window. One that could swallow me whole with the same effort as breathing.”

That whine got louder.

It really did sound like a dog.

“I think it’s what was following us earlier.” I continued. “And as it can apparently figure out what apartment we’re in, I’d say we’re good and fu-”

The whining suddenly stopped. Only to be replaced by the sound of glass shattering and the screech of metal bars being bent or ripped out. I turned to stare at the door in horror. I just did not get the chance to do much else before it splintered into shards of wood. All I could see was the black fur of the wendigo-creature and the massive claws that treated my door like it was made of paper.

Fear had me rooted to that spot. Even Rowan was deathly silent behind me on the couch. I could only watch as the creature finally sat back on its haunches. It looked at me with every single pupil fully dilated. Then it leaned its gigantic head towards me.

It opened that gigantic maw and promptly dropped my baseball bat on the floor.

And proceeded to crouch down like an excited dog. That tail I had seen earlier apparently belonged to the creature, and it was now swinging back and forth. Dimly, I registered that it had knocked everything off the walls in the room with the tail wagging, but I was genuinely struck dumb by what was happening in front of me.

I glanced down at the baseball bat in terrified confusion.

The wendigo-creature moved, using its snout to nudge the bat between the broken bits of door. Clearly trying to get it closer to me.

Trying hard not to tremble like a leaf, and failing miserably, I reached down to pick up the baseball bat. The creature bounded around the room in a circle. Or rather, it turned in a circle, not having very much room to move. It ended up facing me again and once more crouched in the same posture. That tail started wagging again.

“I… think…” Rowan’s words rasped from behind me. I could definitely make out the fear in their voice. “It wants… to play.”

It was enough to jar me out of staring slack jawed at the creature, but it did little to help reduce my fear. I had watched this thing eat a mutated human in much the same way I would eat a hot dog. The fact that it was now trying to get me to play with it like it was someone’s lost pet was just mind-numbingly bizarre.

“I…” I stammered in response. “How? Like… do… I throw it? Play tug of war with it? This thing could eat me if I don’t play with it right.”

“Try tossing?” Rowan suggested.

“Where?” I motioned with the bat to the bedroom that was barely big enough for the creature.

It responded with a happy yip–a noise that sounded like it should have come from a small dog–before it turned to the window.

I finally realized just how much damage the creature had done to the wall in order to get in. The creature had ripped out the window completely. The glass must have shattered on the other side as I saw no pieces on the floor. The creature had bent the metal bars that were built into the wall outwards. It still did not look big enough for the creature to fit through.

Then I watched it slink through like a cat and I just stared.

It climbed out and perched on the fire escape. There was an expectant kind of gleam in its eye. Something that made me certain it would definitely eat me if I did not throw the bat.

I took several frightened steps before I reached the window. The creature gave me another glance before it climbed down from the fire escape and sat on the ground. That tail wagging again while it waited for me to get out the window.

“Oh, well… here goes.” I mumbled, before tossing the bat in the best throw I could manage. Which went a lot further than I thought it would.

Rowan had been right. The creature bounced off to grab the bat and quickly returned. It scaled up the fire escape, dropped the bat at my feet, and then climbed back down again. I let out a breath of air before throwing it again.

The same process repeated.

“Okay…” I said, more to myself than to the creature. “This is weird as fuck… but if you wanna play, we’ll play. Just… you better not eat me after we’re done.”

I saw little choice in trying to get away. Despite the wendigo-creature having traits that reminded me of different animals, I was going to treat it like a big carnivore in a zoo. I guessed that was probably the easiest way to ensure I did not end up getting mauled to death by an irate monster.

We ended up playing fetch-the-bat for what felt like hours. All I knew was that the sun had long set, and it was hard to make out a damn thing outside the creature’s red eyes. They apparently glowed in the dark. Something that was totally not utterly terrifying.

I was about to throw the bat again when I noticed the wendigo-creature had gone still. It had its head cocked and I could barely make out the flick of pointed ears. The creature was clearly listening to something that I could not hear. I glanced out into the darkness but could not make out anything beyond the nearby buildings. And even those were just a darker black against the blackness of night.

The creature suddenly scaled up the fire escape and practically shoved me back through the window.

I landed on my ass with a thud and stared up in confusion. It proceeded to scoop me up with one of its arms, tossing me again, but this time through the door, out of the bedroom. Then it turned back to the window. I heard the audible screeching of metal once more as it pulled the bars back over the window like it was closing the door.

It huffed, bobbed its head, and then proceeded to climb onto my bed. Like a dog, it turned several times. Then, like a cat, it kneaded my mattress into shreds. It was only after it had satisfied itself that it lay down. That tail curling around while its snout faced the window.

“Oh…kay…” I mumbled.

“Looks like… you have a pet.”

Rowan’s voice no longer sounded as raspy as it had. It was still utterly neutral, but it was definitely sounding better.

Getting to my feet, I fumbled through the dark to find the couch. It was like when I had been out on the fire escape. I could make out some shapes, but most of it was just different shades of black. I did make out the lump that was Rowan and dropped into the empty space with a sigh.

“If it eats you, it’s not my fault.” I spoke.

“I don’t think…” There was jostling as if Rowan was moving. “It’s hungry.”

“I certainly hope not.” I rubbed my hands over my face as I thought of just how bizarre this day had been. We had fled the highway in a panic, but it turned out it was just a twenty-foot-tall monster that wanted to play fetch.

“You said… you met it in the forest?”

“Oh… yeah… what did you mean by how was I not dead from the forest?” I asked, completely bypassing the question they had asked.

“Poisonous moss.” Rowan answered, seemingly unbothered by the topic change.

“Poisonous moss?” I quirked an eyebrow in the dark. “I didn’t eat any moss.”

“Spores.” Rowan said. “Make you hallucinate.”

“Oh.” I suddenly recalled the moss I had been crawling all over in the forest. Then I thought of the hare-creature. “What… kind of hallucinations?”

“High doses… like full hallucinations.” Rowan seemed to struggle with how to explain it. “Think… like psychedelic drugs…”

“Oh… that’s not good.” I mumbled. “But how is that lethal?”

“People… wander for days…” Rowan explained. “Starve. Or get… eaten.”

“Wait… I’m confused.” I frowned in the dark. “What do you mean, days? It’s only been like… two days since my plane arrived.”

There was dead silence on the other side of the couch.

“What?” Rowan finally said. “You… think it’s only… been two days… since this started!?”

I remained silent.

It had only been two days since I left the airport… I think?

I thought to myself.

“Ava?” Rowan prompted. “It’s been… three weeks… since planes stopped flying.”

“Three weeks?” I squeaked. “That’s impossible. I literally came in on a flight from Europe! And then got in a car with a former classmate! Who tried to eat me, by the way! And then that thing-” I motioned to the bedroom in the dark. “-showed up and ate him. Then I ran into the forest, killed the fucking cracked out Easter Bunny- which that thing also ate- and then walked through the woods for like… four hours before I came out onto the highway where your buddy was chewing down on your arm. Only to watch him fucking explode like a pimple. Now we’re here at my apartment with a goddamn wendigo sleeping in my bed and you’re telling me that it’s been at least three weeks?!”

It all came out in a verbal vomit of words. Just everything that had happened since I arrived back in the country. It was all so outlandish and bizarre. More like content for a horror novel than for my reality.

Rowan remained silent for several long, almost painful, minutes. “I… think you were… in the forest… for more… than four hours.”

I just stared at them in the dark.

“Moss… makes you hallucinate.” Rowan continued. “What felt like… four hours… could have been… longer.”

I sucked in a breath of air as I froze. What Rowan said made sense. If I really had inhaled psychedelic spores, I might have had a distorted sense of time. Just three weeks made no sense at all to me. A human dies without food after three weeks, but dehydration kills after three days.

I had no memory of eating or drinking in the time I had wandered through the forest.

“H…how am I not dead?” I whispered.