Unburned

The water slowly filled his lungs. The boy flailed in panic, but the surface of the lake remained smooth and still. Cold hands grabbed his clothes, his hair and throat, not allowing to surface. With every desperate movement, his body was filled with searing pain, he was drowning in agony, and eventually fell limply, resigned himself to his fate. Blurred eyes reflected remained light that was eventually hidden by disturbed seaweed. The bottom approached. It was becoming colder and colder. Hands that held him disappeared, and the wide mermaid tail kicked up a cloud of silt. The silt slowly settled onto the motionless body, covering it like a blanket. All he felt was heavy fatigue. The sun went away, and now the light of the moon pierced through the thickness of the water. It was becoming colder and colder… Wait. Colder? “How long have I been lying down here?” His gaze focused on the moon, disfigured by layers of liquid. A growing moon. Beautiful… He slowly turned his head and saw his own white hand, felt wrinkles on the pads of his fingers as he clenched a fist. He slowly sat up. That simple motion felt like it cost all remaining strength. But his heart beat faster with the realization that there was still a chance to fight for life. Standing up was an even more difficult task, and after a few steps the boy sank back down to the bottom. The sand in his eyes made him recall how to blink again. If he could not stand up, he would crawl. Water no longer burned in his chest, but it pulled downwards like a lead weight. Gradually, meter by meter, the boy moved forward. The sand was replaced by sharp stones that he had cut his foot on before, and they painfully scraped his palms now. This pain felt different than the dull, numbing one that had filled every cell in his body. Sharp and unexpected, it reminded him that he was still alive, and his fingers clenched even tighter. When his head emerged from the water, his hair stuck to face and he could no longer see the moonlight, but he still crawled. And only when his entire body was on the shore, he collapsed onto the ground out of strength. As he tried to sit up, supporting himself on his elbows, his entire body shuddered. He coughed uncontrollably, falling down and getting back up again, water spurting out of his mouth. Sometimes he stopped to catch his breath while the water still flowed out of his nose like a thin stream, leaving a nasty tingling feeling. But intense coughs returned again and again. Finally, he managed to take a deep, grunting breath. Water still gurgled quietly in his chest. His body flipped over onto his back, and he finally brushed away the hair that was stuck to his face. The blur from his eyes disappeared as the water no longer obstructed his vision, allowing the boy to see the moon clearly in the night sky. Beautiful. It took some time to get up — the dead seaweed wrapped around his legs. He looked thoughtfully at the trail of plants followed him, and started removing it with trembling hands. He needed a break again. The moon was already starting to disappear behind the horizon when he finally stood up and slowly walked toward the village, stopping from time to time to catch his breath. He sometimes would stumble and fall, taking a few minutes to gather the strength to continue his path. The local children knew the woods like the back of their hand, at least for a few miles around, but that night it was unfamiliar. That night, the woods were shrouded in complete, deafening silence, as if all the living things in fear had run away, flown away, or burrowed deep underground. It felt like even the trees had intentionally spread apart. In the eerie silence, the rustling of fallen leaves under his feet sounded especially loud. It seemed especially creepy. Foreign. Eventually, he realized why — he had never heard such sounds in the middle of summer. The boy sighed in relief when the narrow, trodden forest path changed into a wide, dirt road. There were no souls on the streets of the sleeping village, as he stealthily slipped past the dark windows. Some stray dogs approached him, but as soon as they got closer, they started whimpering and ran away, tucking their tails. In the yard, which he was headed to, clay pots were scattered everywhere, and some of them were broken. He could swear that they were all intact earlier in the morning. The fragments crackled under his feet. Leaning against a ramshackle low fence, he tried to catch his breath and take a closer look at the chaos. What happened here? Finally, he took the last few steps to the door. The wooden door was old, just like the entire house, but every crack was neatly patched up with clay and chips. He knocked and leaned against it, listening carefully. At first, the house was quiet, and only water droplets fell heavily on the wooden doorstep from his clothes was heard. He was already raising his hand to knock again, when he heard the creaking of wood. The sound was approaching, slowly as between each creak, his heart could count dozens of heavy knocks. The door opened. Inside, there was a boy of the same age. Roughly twelve years old, always with messed-up hair and with their skin tanned from the summer sun, usually carefree and smiling, now they both stood there, having suddenly matured after the incident, just staring at each other. “Vein?” The boy who opened the door took a good look at the figure in the doorway, not trusting his eyes. He tightened his grip on the door. Vein barely raised his head to get a better look at him. “Help me”. His voice was hoarse and barely audible. Vein took a step forward, grabbing his friend’s arm as support, but the boy cried out in pain and yanked his arm away, covering it with his palm. He kept switching his gaze between his friend and his trembling hands and back, breathing heavily. Another long moment they both kept staring at each other with shock in their eyes. The door slammed shut suddenly. “Damien, please!” Vein snapped out of whatever trance he was in and fell against the door with his whole body, knocking a few times with the last bit of strength he had left, but there was no response. Bloody prints of cut palms were left on the wood. He leaned his ear against the old door. A constant whispering voice repeatedly came from the door: “Monster”. The second time that night, Vein had the strength in him. This time — to run away. He ran blindly, without thinking about the direction, ignoring his friend’s terrified voice echoing in his ears. His feet carried him back into the depths of the forest, until he reached the same lake again. The summer day when they both came here together seemed like a distant memory now. The lifeless female body floated on the surface of the water, bobbing with the moonlight that illuminated her. Vine stopped for a moment, his gaze locked on the drowned woman. But soon he realized that where her legs should have been was a wide mermaid tail. The boy’s arms instinctively clenched into fists. Tears filled his eyes. He ran further away. Near dawn, Vein collapsed onto an empty clearing in the forest. The woods were awakening now, the night silence replacing with birds' chirping. He watched a butterfly land on his open palm. A second later, it fell down into the grass. Dead. *** Damien leaned against the door, but nobody was trying to knock or wiggle the handle anymore. The boy slowly slid down onto the floor. His burned hand stung as if he was struck with a hot frying pan. Even in the half-darkness, it was visible that the skin under his palm turned dark, and he hissed loudly from the pain as the sleeve rolled down and the fabric touched injured place. He hastily went through the events of the previous day in his mind, frantic and anxious. How they had said goodbye to his mother early in the morning when she went to trade in town and walked, singing songs, behind her wagon until it completely disappeared out of sight. How they almost fought with other boys on their way to the river and ran away, laughing, looking for another place to swim. How they hid in the shade of the trees to escape the blistering summer sun and made it to the lake, how they playfully tried to drown each other… until his friend remained underwater for too long. How he was calling for him from the shore. And how something that resembled his friend appeared in the village late at night. Reminiscent, but still far from what Vein had used to look like, like something that could only copy people in the distant way that evil creatures can. Damien remembered the stories his parents told him from his childhood very well. He recognized him at first glance, yet it was not his friend. It couldn’t be. His friend, with a sunburned face and laughter like a silver bell, remained in the lake. And that thing was grayhaired and harsh, with pale skin and protruding bones. And the eyes, which faintly glowed in the darkness, were staring deep into his soul. Damian quickly dashed across the room, seizing a knife from the kitchen table with his good hand. That night, he didn’t sleep, afraid that he would hear footsteps on the other side of the door.