Story 2:
It takes four hours to get to the small graveyard. The walk is easy, but the road is long and has been taken back by nature. I cross my arms “When you said ‘digging for treasure’, I didn’t think you meant grave robbing.”
“Is there a point to digging up graves? How can it be more lucrative than robbing houses?” James leans against a tree, looking unimpressed.
“You don’t have to be such a pessimist. Do you need a hug?” Taylor smirks and throws herself at James.
“I’m being realistic,” He tries to fight Taylor off with a grin on his face, “Hey, stop that!”
“Alright, alright. That’s enough,” As stern as he might sound, Robert is amused. He lets them drag him into the mock fight.
While Rob deals with them, I take the time to look around the clearing. A chapel sits near the edge of the forest. Glass glitters on the window sills as a cool breeze rustles the tree leaves. The evening sun casts long shadows, keeping me from seeing inside the building from where I’m standing.
Moss covers the tombstones and they’re irregularly spaced. I scrape the moss off of one of them; the name and anything else that had been carved in the stone has been erased by time. Some of the older markers must’ve been made of wood and rotted over the years. An angel stands on a pedestal at the other end of the clearing, watching over the graveyard.
I walk between the graves, trying to not step on them, to get a better look at the statue. Her wings are spread with her hands clasped in prayer, but her head isn’t bowed. A shiver crawls down my spine when I look at her face. She had a beautiful face, but she didn’t have eyes. It looks like they’ve been carved out, and looking into them makes me uncomfortable.
“How do you think Robert found this place?”
“Jesus!” My hand flies up to my chest and I whip around. I didn’t hear Taylor walk up behind me, “Don’t sneak up on me like that.”
“Sorry.” She hands me a shovel.
“Knowing him, he probably found it on some top ten haunted graveyards list.”
Taylor gives me an amused smile, “I’m glad tourists aren’t a problem. Which grave are we starting with?”
“That one,” I point to a grave close to the forest’s edge, and hopefully out of the angel’s line of sight. We dig together and make small talk.
After three hours of digging, the sun has fully set, and the forest is dead quiet. There’s a full moon tonight, but it’s not high enough to cast light into the grave. We have to use a flashlight to see where we’re digging. Taylor and I started switching places. the hole is too cramped for two people to work.
“You’re the one that wanted to do this shit!”
I peek out of the grave. Taylor looks comfortable watching James and Robert flailing their arms at each other. “How long have they been doing that?”
“They’ve been at it for a little bit.”
James continues yelling at Robert, “Get off your lazy ass and help!”
I glance at the angel, it seems like she’s watching them. “You know,” I say. Taylor turns her attention to me, but grimaces when Robert whines about being tired, “we’re almost finished with this one. So, go help James before he decides to beat Rob to death with his shovel.”
“You sure? It’s almost time for us to switch places.”
“Yeah, I’m sure. I’ll yell when I’m done.” Taylor makes her way over to our friends.
Robert charges past after a few minutes. His fists are clenched and he’s panting like he’s running a marathon. “Rob!” He ignores me and goes into the forest. I shrug to myself. There are more important things at the moment than trying to calm him down.
It doesn’t take much more digging before my shovel breaks through the coffin lid. I pick up my flashlight and point it at the spot in front of me. The boards are rotten, and I’m surprised the coffin hasn’t collapsed under my weight yet. I chop a hole in the coffin with the shovel and toss the chunks out. A dessicated skeleton lies within. The only things of value are a simple gold ring and locket.
I snap the finger off, shake the ring onto my palm, and pocket it. The head is easy to pull off with only the paper thin membrane holding it on. The locket hangs on a fine chain; I try to be as gentle with it as possible. Surely these will be worth more than the gold they’re made of. “Hey, help me get out!”
James pulls me halfway out. I crawl out the rest of the way. Taylor watches us with a weird look on her face. I take the jewelry out of my pocket and hold them up to show the other two with a grin on my face.
James runs a hand down his face and asks, “Where is Robert?”
Taylor watches me put the jewelry back in my pocket. I frown, “He hasn’t come back yet?”
“It’s been about two hours since he left. I know you followed him, but when you came back, he wasn’t with you.” She stares at the forest and mumbles, “Just thought he needed some time to cool off…”
“I didn’t follow him.” They ignore me.
“The bastard probably ditched us.”
Taylor chews on her thumbnail, she wants to say something. “Since Robert isn’t here to supervise us,” I try to keep my voice light and playful, “We could look around in the chapel. There might be something valuable in it.”
“Better than digging up graves for scraps.” James makes his way to the chapel.
I try to follow him, but Taylor grabs my shirt sleeve, “I don’t understand why he’s angry. The entire time we were digging, he wouldn’t shut up about how worthless Rob is.” Taylor glances at the chapel and lowers her voice, “If he hadn’t left, I think James would’ve killed him. Let’s go before he gets pissed at us too.”
We walk to the chapel together. James’ flashlight can be seen through the windows. Taylor goes in first, and I pause before following her in. The statue is watching us. I rush into the chapel, and it feels like hiding.
Moonlight filters through the holes in the roof and illuminates patches on the floor. I turn on my flashlight to get a better look at the room, the light from James’ isn’t enough to get a good look. Rotten books, chunks from the pews, and wood and shingles from the roof and ceiling cover the floor. Stained pews are either knocked over, broken in half, peppered with bullet holes, or a combination of the three.
James has already kicked out a trail through the debris. Taylor’s trail is much smaller in comparison. She works as far away from James as possible. I make my own path to the center of the chapel and start tossing junk out of my way. Every time I find a piece of jewelry, I glance at the other two to make sure they aren’t watching me before I shove them in my pocket.
James and Taylor give up on the search. He grumbles to himself while he throws the book-shaped lumps at the remaining window panes. Taylor wanders around the chapel, phone in the air, trying to get a signal. “I’m going outside, I can’t get a signal in here.” She storms out the door and slams it behind her.
James flops onto a still intact pew. It groans, but it doesn’t collapse. “You should be careful around her, Amber.”
“Why?”
“The bitch is jealous of you. If you were paying attention, you’d realize it.”
“What the hell is wrong with you lately?”
He gets up, “You want to know what’s wrong with me? I’ve had to listen to Robert whine,” it doesn’t take long for him to get in my face, “and Taylor bitch about how you always get everything she wants, and now I have to put up with you!”
“Fuck you, James!” I shove him away. The door almost falls off of its hinges when I throw it open and leave.
It takes a moment to find Taylor, but she’s still wandering around, trying to get a signal. She’s not paying attention when I walk up behind her and ask, “Any luck?”
She drops her phone and spins around, “Christ!” She glares at me while she tries to calm down, “I can’t get anything. The service was fine earlier, but now, it’s non-existent.” She picks the phone up and shows it to me. The text had been sent but hasn’t gone through.
She puts the phone back in her pocket and crosses her arms, “Why are you out here anyway?”
“James is an ass.” I look at the angel, but it isn’t there anymore, “What happened to the statue?”
Taylor sighs and rolls her eyes, “What statue? I would’ve noticed it earlier if there was one.”
“Sorry,” It doesn’t seem like she’s screwing around and I’m not interested in arguing, “Just trying to scare you.”
“Of course you are.”
“Maybe we should look for Robert so we can get out of here.”
She doesn’t want to look for him with me, but she agrees. Taylor assumes I know where Robert went and follows me. We wander around, that’s the only thing I can call it, for what feels like hours. Taylor breaks the silence, “I hear someone crying.” She runs before I can grab her.
“Wait!” I chase after her, “I didn’t hear anything!”
She stops and I almost knock her over. Taylor stands there with her hand covering her mouth. Robert’s body lies on the ground in front of us. Something clawed a hole in his chest and tore the bones out. I crouch down next to him. His heart was ripped out.
I roll his body over and pull out his wallet. There’s a few hundred dollar bills, but before I can put them in my own pocket, Taylor tackles me. “I deserve that more than you,” She tries to take it from me, “I’ve known him longer than you have!”
“I’m doing what he wanted us to do!” I struggle to keep the money and prevent her from strangling me, “At least we don’t have to dig him up!”
She succeeds in grabbing the cash when my phone gets a notification. I let her have the victory for now and check my phone. The text Taylor thought she sent to Robert pops up. “Look,” I shove my phone in her face, “you sent that text to me instead of Robert.”
She reads it and clenches her jaw, “Robert sent that to you.”
“He couldn’t have sent me this because he’s dead and he left his phone in the car.”
“He told you he was in love with you,” Taylor rubs her eyes.
“Taylor, Rob has never told me anything like that. Can we just get James and leave?”
She starts crying, “I don’t want to leave Rob here, but yeah.”
We should have been lost, but it doesn’t take us long to get to the clearing. Taylor is still upset and goes to wait near the road. “James,” I yell, “We’re leaving!”
He doesn’t respond. I check the edges of the clearing and the grave Taylor and I dug with no results. The chapel is the last place I check, I don’t expect him to still be in there though. With the first sweep of my flashlight, it doesn’t seem like he’s here, but some of the garbage has been knocked back into the path James made.
I walk up to the front of the room to find James lying on the floor. There are bruises around his throat and his chest is in the same shape as Robert’s. “Amber, I found James!” I stumble over the garbage on my way out.
“Over here!”
I run to Taylor, the smell of rotting meat knocks the breath out of me, and try to pull her away. “Taylor, we need to leave.” She yanks her arm away.
The thing pretending to be James asks, “Why leave, when we can find shit like this?” He holds a gem encrusted pendant up.
Taylor reaches out to take it, but I smack her hand away. “Do you really need that too?!”
I grab her shoulders and try to shake some sense into her, “That isn’t James!”
“Fuck you!” She shoves me on the ground and snatches the necklace from its hand. It grabs her arm with clawed hands.
I get up and run to the road leading out of the graveyard. I ignore her screams and run until I can’t. While I’m catching my breath, I look around and nearly cry. I’m back at the graveyard. That thing isn’t here, so I can get my money back from Taylor.
Her body is a broken and twisted mess. The money falls out of her shirt when I kick her over to dig through her pockets. With her chest shredded, I consider myself lucky and walk back to the road. I laugh until I feel a pressure crushing my head. My head turns to the side, against my will, and something pops.
