Willravel

Between the building and us was a large area of the Sidewalk that had been covered by a previous avalanche, making it very difficult to pass. I came up with the brilliant idea of passing only a few at a time, never one at a time but few enough so that we didn't put a lot of weight on what could have been very loose ground. First across was Jon and Rusty, then Gooch and some kid I didn't know. I was responsible for helping people on the side we'd come from and Jon was helping people on the other side, but the size of the area covered was large enough and covered with enough brush and debris that we couldn't even see each other from each side. I was helping the next pair over when one of them slipped and started falling off the side. The drop was easily fifteen feet, so letting the person fall, while not fatal, could have lead to serious injury. The other person crossing and I grabbed the girl that was grasping at roots and tried to pull her up. In our attempt, however, we managed to make the pass even worse. This was bad: we now had two groups separated by an impassable obstacle. Instead of shouting to Jon on the other side, I called him on his cell phone. He said he'd wait on the other side of the collapse and I would try to find a pass above the area by hiking upwards on the hill. If I didn't call him in 15 minutes, he was to jump down the somewhat shorter distance on his side—perhaps ten feet—and then walk along the wall with the group as we headed back.

After I was content that neither group was going to move, I headed up the hill alone to see if I could find a safe path. As I was walking away from the group, a realization came to me: I was scared. It had been easier for me to subdue (mask?) my fear when I was with the group because there's a certain power in taking a leadership role over a group of people, as I had done. Now, however, I was by myself, separated from the groups by an increasing distance. Within minutes, the flashlight from the group I'd left was out of sight and I could no longer hear their whispering. I still had my bearings, if I had to turn back, but it was just me and the trees now. The area of land displaced by the avalanche was much larger than I had anticipated. I had gone a good half-mile up the hill before I could cross above loose soil. I remember specifically hearing a twig snap behind me as I made my way back down to the other side, but I don't remember seeing anything. The feeling of being watched was still acutely in my mind.

The Sidewalk on the opposite side of the debris was coming into focus ahead, but I couldn't see anyone. The closer I got, the more anxious I was getting. Shit! I checked my watch... it had been a good 25 minutes. I pulled out my cell phone and called Jon, but he didn't answer. Fucking shit! I called back to the other side, where I'd come from. No answer. I took a deep breath to calm myself and considered my options. I could either continue up the Sidewalk to the building where Jon and the others may have gone or I could try and make my way back in case they followed the plan (something Jon wasn't good at) and were heading back along the wall. I figured it would be a smarter bet to run up the Sidewalk toward the building and see if I could spot them, and then get back to the other side of the debris if I couldn't find them. I took a deep breath, gathered any bit of fortitude I had left, and took off.

It was a hospital. It was an abandoned hospital, probably designed and built in the 60s, and it was right at the end of the Sidewalk. My stomach was in my throat and my blood was running cold. I looked around where the Sidewalk met up with a rear parking lot, but there didn't seem to be any evidence that Jon, Mike or Gooch had been there. Relieved that I didn't have to go check the building, I turned to run back to the collapsed area of the Sidewalk. I started running when I heard something loud hit the ground behind me. I spun around too quickly and fell, almost tumbling clear off the Sidewalk. I didn't see anything, but the sound wasn't a figment of my imagination. It sounded like a metal plate hitting asphalt or maybe a manhole cover being thrown on concrete.

I pride myself on being a pragmatic, no-nonsense kinda person. I'm not superstitious, I don't believe in ghosts or anything supernatural; I'm a bit of a skeptic. For whatever reason, this startling moment managed to shock my investigative side back into action. Spirits aren't real, ghosts aren't real, and monsters aren't real. The only really dangerous things in these hills are perhaps a mountain lion (or that dog). Cougars don't particularly like to confront or especially attack humans because we don't resemble their normal prey at all. They tend to avoid that which they don't understand. And even if one did confront me, the whole looking big and making lots of noise thing seemed a reasonable response. I cleaned myself up and calmly walked back toward the hospital.

I followed where I thought the noise had come from, around the right side of the rectangular building, probably heading toward the main parking lot and entrances. The lots were overgrown and the building was in disrepair. There was an old hurricane fence around the outside of what I assumed was the main property, but parts of that had been knocked over and even were missing. When I turned the next corner I had a better view of the hospital. I won't post the name here, but it wasn't a place that I was familiar with. The lot was just paved asphalt without any planters or anything. The main entrance had been boarded up and had some graffiti on them. Only about half the windows had boards on them, though, and many of those uncovered were broken.

There was a familiar shape in front of one of the broken windows. It was a tire iron. I ran over and checked it out. It was similar to the one Mike had, but I couldn't be sure it was the same. Still, what are the odds of there being a similar tire iron out there? I looked as carefully as I could through the broken window from the outside, but it was too dark to see anything. Not having a flashlight, I opened my flip phone and very carefully climbed through the broken window closest to where I'd found the tire iron.

The building smelled of dust and rubber. Having been born in 1983, I'm really only used to hospitals smelling of iodine and rubbing alcohol, so this was a very alien scent. The window was alongside a hallway that lead to what seemed to be little doctors' offices. The stupid phone would only stay bright for maybe 10 seconds before dimming and then another before going dark completely, so I was having to close and open the phone a good 5 times a minute just to use its light. This meant there were moments in complete darkness. The rooms each seemed to be emptied out completely, no chairs or tables, just the wallpaper and holes in the walls where fixtures had been. As I was checking every room, I was debating with myself the possible benefits and consequences for calling out my missing friends' names. In what was looking back probably not a very pragmatic decision, I decided to keep quiet. The layout of the first floor was very straightforward and I was able to do a sweep in about fifteen minutes without finding a thing. Would they really have gone to the second floor of a derelict building? I figured I would just go to the top of the stairs—carefully—and see if there was anything to see.

Fortunately, the staircase was in good shape compared to much of the rest of the abandoned hospital. The thing was thick concrete and really wouldn't be a danger to walk on for decades, even partially exposed to the elements. When I got to the top of the stairs, I could see that the second floor didn't follow the same floor plan as the first. With a combination of fear, frustration, and curiosity, I decided to make a sweep of the second floor. smell seemed to only get more potent the higher I had gotten and it was starting to get a bit distracting, so I pulled up my t-shirt over my nose. In hindsight, I probably shouldn't have used so much Axe body spray that particular day. As I ventured deeper into the second floor, the sounds of creaking and snapping started to become more prevalent. The floor didn't seem to be giving way or anything like that, but it wasn't used to being walked on. Wait... is that a footprint? I pointed my flashlight/cell phone down at the ground as I squatted, trying to get maximum light and clarity. There was a shape in the dust, but I couldn't make out for sure if it was a tennis shoe or a boot. It was just the general shape of a foot. There was another, and another. I followed the footprints carefully around a few corners until they went into a locked storage room door. I took a deep breath and knocked. Nothing. I knocked a bit louder. Still nothing. I checked out the footprints again just to be sure. Yes, the person clearly went into this room. I banged on the door now, "Jon?! Mike?! Gooch?!" The building echoed with my voice, but there was no reply. I took a few steps back, lined up, and kicked the door just to the side of the handle. The door crashed open with a bang so loud it startled me. It was pitch black so I lifted my phone into place to see if I could see anyone... anything. The room was too big for the tiny light to be reflected back at me, though. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end. I went through the door, holding my phone in one hand and the tire iron in the other.

The first thing I got a good look at was a shelving system, then another. There was dust and cobwebs everywhere, making the little light I had even less effective. The room was so quiet, that the sound of the dust under my feet as I walked was nearly deafening. The room was a labyrinth of shelves and boxes, making checking it a great deal more involved than any previous rooms. I'd checked about half the room when an odd scent crossed my nose, managing to overpower even my body spray. It was sour, sickening. I pulled down my throat to locate the source, and the scent filled my nostrils. It sparked a scent-memory, one from my childhood when my dad had first started showing me how to barbecue meats. He had intended my first lesson to be lamb shish kabobs, German style, but when we retrieved the meat from it's plastic container it had rotted quite terribly. That was it! The smell was meat, rotting meat. The consequences of this revelation washed over me, filling me with dread and confusion. There was a rotting meat smell behind a locked door in an abandoned hospital, the hospital from the old urban legends about the Sidewalk. The stubbornness of my skepticism and the terror of unknown danger clashed in my mind. Fuck this shit, I thought, I'm going to get to the bottom of this and if I get killed by a spirit or whatever at least I'll have verifiable evidence that I was in danger instead of running from shadows. Or something to that effect. I let some anger gather in my gut to build fortitude and I went on checking the room, getting closer to the scent. I got to the back corner, farthest from the door, when I saw an odd shape on the ground, something alien to this right-angled environment of shelves and boxes.

A rat; perhaps the king of rats from the Nutcracker. The remains of a rat the side of my forearm were decaying away on the ground. I looked more closely and breathed a sigh of relief: there was no discernible shape or unnatural placement of the remains, it was just a dead rat. For the first time that night, I felt relief. I was being stupid this whole damned time. Jon and the others clearly went back with my group and were probably waiting for me. I let out a chuckle at how silly I'd been: Will, with the willies. I turned around just in time to see the door, which I'd kicked in and partially destroy, slam closed. I jumped out of my skin and then dove behind a box for cover. I pulled my phone out and pointed it at the door, and the rest of the room. I was alone. I ran to the door and opened it, checking both ways down the hallway. Nothing. I sprinted down the hallway, down the stairs and out the window. As I was running from the hospital, down the Sidewalk, it occurred to me that there was probably a rational explanation for the door closing, perhaps the wind coming in through a big rat hole, but I could think of nothing for the footprints. The footprints clearly lead to the locked door and into the storage room. And the footprints couldn't have been that old.

In no time I was back at the collapsed area of the Sidewalk and started sprinting up the hill to retrace my path. I cleared the path in no time at all and made my way back down to where I assumed my friends were waiting for me. No one was there. God damn it. I continued sprinting, shooting downhill along the Sidewalk. A wind met my back as I rounded a turn and I lost my footing, sliding on my side. I looked up just in time to see a dark shape making its way after me. The sound of clicking fingernails was soon audible and growing louder. It was that damned dog! I got back to my feet and looked around for the tire iron I'd found, but it had slipped off the side and into the brush fifteen feet below. Looking back, it probably would have been the smarter move to try and intimidate the dog, but at that moment, fight or flight being triggered deep inside my instinctive brain, I choose flight. And did I ever fly. I redoubled my effort, speeding down the Sidewalk as fast as my legs possibly could. The dog was still gaining on me, albeit slowly, so I had to switch tactics. The drop off the Sidewalk, now to my left, was inconsistent. At some times it was a good twenty feet, at others closer to six. I resolved to take a considerable risk and jump just as the dog was just behind me. I saw an area coming up where it couldn't have been more than seven feet and I lunged off the side, tumbling and spinning until I came to an abrupt stop banging my thigh into the trunk of a tree. The dog, surprisingly, followed. While I didn't expect the dog would jump after me, I had anticipated the unlikely possibility. I got to my feet and ran back at the Sidewalk, jumping at the side and getting my forearm on the ledge for leverage I pulled myself up. I remember taunting the dog in an unsportsmanlike display, and then I continued on.

A throbbing pain in my right thigh was making it difficult to run, so I slowed back to a walk again. I pulled out my cellphone and tried everyone again.

"Oh, hey Will. We're back at the cars. You okay?" Jon was almost nonchalant. Fuckers.

"Yeah, other than a dog attack I'm gravy..." a common phrase of mine back then that I've thankfully grown out of... "but what the hell happened to you guys?"

"We went back over the dirt and walked back to the cars."

"...don't you think you forgot something?" I pretended to be mad, but I was mostly just relieved. The thought of being totally alone out there wasn't something I wanted to face.

"We figured you ditched us and went back to the car."

"Nah, I went to the hospital." There was a pause.

"Wait, what? You found it?" Jon's voice had changed. It sounded as if he was about to change his mind and try this stupid adventure all over again.

"Nah, I'm kidding. I'll be back there in like five minutes, I'm almost at the tracks now." I hung up, deciding it wasn't worth it.

I was approaching the train tracks when I came upon the hole in the Sidewalk where we'd run into the stoners before. I looked over the edge, intending to say hey, but they were gone. The blanket was still there, the bong was still there, and a ziplock full of product was sitting in the corner. The electric lantern was even still on. I carefully checked in both directions of the Sidewalk for any sign of movement, then I jumped in. It appeared that all of their stuff was there, even a pair of shoes. I grabbed the lantern and went topside again, looking for them. There was no sign of them. I turned the lantern off and put it back. I couldn't let my paranoia run away with me, there's no reason to think they're in any kind of trouble... aside from that dog. I thought back to when we'd first parked at the dead end, trying to picture in my mind every detail. Our cars weren't the only there, I realized.

I opened my phone and voice-called Jon. "Call Jon. No, call Jon. No, CALL JON." then I just dialed his number.

"Jon, are you still at the cars?"

"Yeah, we're waiting on you. Hurry up, man."

"Are there any other cars there? The ones that were there when we first got here?"

"What? Um, I don't know which of these was here. There's an old Saab, a Toyota pickup and that beater." It was the same, no cars had left. Fuck. Did I really want to turn this into a search and rescue, especially with that dog still out there? Wait!

"Does Mike still have his tire iron?" I asked.

"Mike...Mike... do you still got your weapon?" I heard an affirmative and some joking in the background. "Yeah, dude, he's a savage with that thing."

"Good. Do we have anything else in the cars that might do the same job?"

"Job? Like chasing ghost dog the way of the samurai? I guess."

"Grab that shit and meet me at where the tracks meet the Sidewalk." I hung up before he could protest.

I was starting to feel a lot better, like I was wrangling control of the universe back from the specter of fear. It was time to go on the offensive and soon I would have numbers... an army on my side.

"We're going to find those fucking stoners."