I hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving. Today is the day of left overs and oddly my mother wants to hit a few stores today. Usually we avoid the in person Black Friday and just do on line shopping. She has two stores she wants to visit though so we shall see how crazy it is. I suspect after one, she will rethink number two. But for now, everyone is still in a turkey coma so lets get the prompt done. Timers at the ready and off we go.
I suspect this one will get very dark the further into it I go, so perhaps it is best to leave it there for now.
Friday, November 24th: The dog wagged his tail.
The dog wagged his tail. Evan smiled. “Good boy,” he said. He knew that meant Rufus picked up the scent. The tail wagged harder with the praise. “Follow,” Evan said. Rufus parked once and began to move off towards the tree line. Evan followed behind. Seeing him following, Rufus picked up speed and Evan lengthened his stride.
He hurried after the dog, making sure to keep Rufus in sight as they moved from the field and deeper into the woods. He was worried the trail would have gone cold but it seemed that Rufus could still follow. Evan kept the plastic bag with the scent filled t-shirt in his hand incase Rufus needed a scent refresher.
Evan’s heart beat wildly as he followed Rufus. He was dimly aware that they seemed to be on some sort of path through the woods. It wasn’t wide or well worn, but it was there. Rufus stuck to the center of it as they went deeper into the woods. All around them the trees seemed to close in. He doubted people routinely came this deeply into the forest and wondered about the trail. Had it been made when people did routinely come into the forest or was it some sort of game trail?
He knew that if he stopped he might be able to figure that out, but at the moment all that mattered was keeping Rufus in sight and following him to wherever the trail led. He knew the statistics and time was running out. Over head clouds scudded across the sky and in the distance thunder sounded. One good rain would wash what little remained of the trail away. They could not afford to stop now. They had to keep going.
Evan tried not to dwell on the possibility of being too late. He grit his teeth using them to lock in the annoyance he felt at the delay. Everyone was so certain of what happened. The thought that Kyle was not with his father had not even occurred to anyone. At least until they managed to track down Kyle’s father and realized that he had ben out of town for the better part of a month. Still the search concentrated on the fact that Kyle might not have known his father was out of town and headed out to his place anyway.
It wasn’t until that trail dead ended that someone began asking the questions that should have been asked in the first place. That led to a sighting here and Evan with Rufus was sent out. He had a number to call if he found anything, but as no one expected him to be successful, he was out here alone.
Rufus stopped and barked. Evan pushed forward and found himself in a small clearing. He joined the dog and waited as Rufus sniffed out possible trails. There were several leading away from the clearing. Evan looked around as he waited for Rufus to reorient himself. The dog wasn’t sure what trail to take and Evan could see that several trails ended up reaching the clearing.
Ten til Midnight 