Flash Fiction Friday -- Weekend on the Lake in Flash Friday

Prompts: smooth pebble, dirty rag, buried somewhere

Cheyenne slammed her back against the wall and gasped for air.

The blood was soaking through the dirty rag she had tied around her wrist, but at least the flow was no longer such a frightening torrent. The shed was behind the house, which now stood between her and the lake. She surveyed the edge of the wood line in front of her.

The man would know the woods. Even if he had no tracking skills, he could probably predict where she would end up. There seemed little point in running that way, but every primitive mammalian instinct screamed that she needed to find cover and find it fast.

Cheyenne took in a deep breath, held it for a couple of seconds, and forced herself to release it slowly. She had to think and to do that she would have to be calm.

Jonah and Dylan were dead. The man had cut both their throats in the kitchen on the first night. They were probably already buried somewhere on the island. Nattie, on the other hand, had suffered. She had been raped and tortured. If God were at all merciful, she was gone by now. Zach was the only unknown.

It was supposed to have been a fun weekend on the lake. They had some booze, some pot, a little E. They brought along some lanterns, a cooler and sleeping bags so that they would be comfortable in the abandoned house on the island in the middle of the lake. There would be no hotel or camping fees. No one to bother them. They could do whatever they wanted all weekend long.

The first night was great. They had reached the island late in the day. They swam, drank, got a little high, had a little sex. The next morning they sent Zach back to the mainland in one of the canoes to replenish some supplies.

The man came while Zach was gone. It all happened so fast.

The second canoe!

If Cheyenne could get down to the beach, she might be able to get back to the mainland herself.

Cheyenne ran into the trees and circled around the house to reach the path that led down to the beach. When she had descended far enough down the hill that she figured she wouldn’t be visible from the house, she emerged from the trees and broke into a run. The packed clay gave way to loose sand and then to smooth pebbles as she reached the shoreline. The canoe was resting on the beach.

Cheyenne pushed herself with a maniacal laugh to run faster towards the canoe. She altered her course to try to push the canoe into the water without breaking her stride, but the canoe did not yield as readily as she hoped it would. Cheyenne cried out in frustration and pushed harder. The rocky soil gave way under her feet and she slid to her knees with little progress to show for her effort.

She regained her footing and repositioned herself against the canoe to push again when she noticed the gaping hole in the boat. In that moment Cheyenne could not imagine how the hole had gotten there. As she stepped back from the boat a flicker of motion caught her eye.

The man was coming.

Cheyenne grabbed the first thing she could so that she could defend herself. The man had closed the gap between them surprisingly quickly. Cheyenne swung an oar in just enough time to deflect the axe that was dropping towards her head.

The man swung the axe several more times. Cheyenne yelped each time the weapon made contact with the oar. With each swing it became harder for Cheyenne to recover from the blow. Her arms ached. Her head was spinning. She could barely see through the sheen of desperate tears.

Cheyenne pushed upwards with the oar when she realized she had fallen unto her back. She was mesmerized by the axe, which seemed to move in slow motion. The blade retreated, hovered momentarily and then came down towards her face.

She wondered if death would hurt.

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