William Royden

But I couldn't.

My nerve failed me as soon as I heard the door crash open above and two sets of footsteps rush down the wooden stairs.

When I caught just a glimpse of someone or something larger than courting through the gloom, I leapt up to the window desperately and dragged myself out of the house, scraping my stomach and my arms badly in my shrieking effort to get away.

When my hips got caught, I wrenched them free and felt grass rip through the waist of my jeans, tearing my flesh.

Once fully outside, I grabbed my camera off the ground.

I ran toward the woods 20 yards behind my grandfather's property.

The thought that those woods might mutate and change to engulf me, never entering my frenzied mind.

I didn't look back.

I heard one last sound of something heavy, a body, slamming into a cement wall.

Then I was gone, running blindly through the trees, branches cutting my face.

The geography of Robinson remained rational for me as I fled.

Within three minutes, I reached the road and kept running.

It wasn't far to the commuter train station, which was unattended and dimly lit.

I got onto a waiting train car with my return ticket and collapsed alone inside.

Tears and sweat were pouring down my face.

I was bleeding from dozens of small cuts, but I felt no pain.

Blessedly, the train left almost immediately, taking me far away.

But just before it began to move, I caught sight of a solitary figure on the

piled platform, a woman walking along very slowly and with seemingly no thought toward boarding the train.

She was holding one arm as if injured.