The Cabin in the Woods

The main room beyond the front door was living room and kitchen combined, and Dana was walking around slowly, touching nothing, as the others entered. To the right was a dining table and chairs, and a kitchen counter featuring poorly crafted wall and floor cupboards with a retro-fitted sink, the single tap dripping steadily. At the end of the counter stood an antique wood-burning stove, probably built before Marty’s grandparents were even born. Its bulk and solidity seemed somehow out of place beside the rest of the kitchen, as if it was the only part that bled quality. “Oh, this is awesome!” Curt said.

“It is kinda cool,” Jules replied. “You gonna kill us a raccoon to eat?”

“I will use its skin to make a cap.”

To the left in the huge room was the living area, with mismatched sofas and chairs arranged around the large stone fireplace. It looked comfortable, but strangely unloved, as if it were a place used for necessity rather than desire. Hanging back in the doorway, Marty spotted a wolf’s head on the wall-courtesy of the old guy at the station, perhaps? It had been stuffed growling, and was just about one of the most vicious looking things he’d ever seen. That would get a shirt thrown over it before dusk, he was damn certain of that, by him if no one else. Its eyes seemed alive. Directly opposite the front door a bare, wide hallway ran to the rear of the cabin, with two doorways leading off from either side. Between it and the kitchen there was a rectangle in the floor that appeared to be a way into the cellar. A few worn rugs littered the floor. The window at the hallway’s end was obscured by nets and dust, and whatever lay beyond was dark, as if the woods back there cut out all sunlight.

Dana paused before the stuffed wolf’s head, then moved on. Her footsteps were soft and gentle, hardly heard, and Marty wondered what lay beneath the timber-boarded floor.

Jules strode confidently along the hallway to check out the bedrooms. She grabbed a doorknob and twisted.

“Dibs on whichever room is-OW!” She jerked her hand back and stared at the bubble of blood welling on her fingertip.

I’m still not inside, Marty thought. The others are and they’re fine, they’re at ease with the place, but I’m still not…

“Curt, your cousin’s house attacked me,” Jules exclaimed with mock severity.

“I smell lawsuit,” Curt said.

“When was your last tetanus shot?” Holden chuckled, and Marty noticed how close Dana had drawn to him. Not quite touching.

“Thanks, that’s very comforting,” Jules responded.

“Jules is pre-med,” Curt said sadly, stroking his girlfriend’s hair. “She knows there’s no coming back from this. I’ll miss you, baby. I’ll miss your shiny new hair.” Dana glanced around then and looked at Marty, drawing him into their group again. He blinked, a little startled. He’d been off in his own world again.

“Marty? Are you planning on coming in?”

“Maybe,” he said. “Maybe.” But he waited until the four of them picked up their bags and headed down the hallway before he made his move.

Once across the threshold he sighed, looking around and listening to the others joking and chatting in their rooms.

He looked at the wolf and growled.

Holden took the first room on the left, next to Dana’s. He was excited. It had been a weird journey up from the city, the lowest point being that ignorant fuck at the gas stop. But now that they were here he could feel them all relaxing, and it wouldn’t be long before they made this place their own.

Unpack, change, get the keg into the living room, sort out food for this evening, have a few more drinks… and maybe even one of Marty’s joints… and then the weekend would really begin.

And there was Dana. He could feel the charge between them growing, and now he was certain that she felt it too. She was as keen to be close to him as he was to her. It felt a little awkward in the company of the others-he’d invaded their group, after all, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that Curt had brought him along as a potential fix-up. But he couldn’t deny the effect she was having over him.

He only hoped she’d brought a bikini.

He glanced at a picture on the wall-some old Victorian scene-then threw his bag on the bed and winced at how much it creaked. Sitting on the mattress and bouncing lightly up and down, he felt certain the resultant squeaking would attract bears from miles around. He hoped Curt’s and Jules’s bed wasn’t this bad, otherwise none of them would be getting any sleep. If what Curt claimed was true, they went at it like rabbits.