3.4

The park is an awkward distance from the apartment - too far to walk in the cold, but only ten minutes by car. They drive there a few hours after sunset, in Otter’s car, and don’t say a word to each other the whole way there. Landis looks silently out the window and drums his fingers on his jeans, watching as the scenery gradually turns from forest and old, brick buildings to modern houses. He had assumed the park would be in a more rural area of Antlers, but it’s hidden in the middle of the suburbs, down a driveway between two fast food joints. Otter parks at one of the latter establishments and they walk the rest of the way to the park entrance, the driveway turning into a long, winding road paved only by loose gravel.

The entrance is roped off by a loosely hanging chain with a sign proclaiming the park is only open from dawn to dusk, and to come back tomorrow, thank you very much. Otter puts a hand on one of the posts the chain is attached to and effortlessly vaults over to the other side, his shoes coming down heavy on the wooden bridge that leads into the park proper. Landis glances around nervously. Shouldn’t they have a night watch here or something?

“You still want to do this, right?” Otter asks.

“I’m not sure if this is worth getting arrested again for,” Landis says, “if the cops happen to show up.”

Otter laughs. “They aren’t going to show up. If they do, I know a ton of ways to get out of the woods without coming back this way.”

“What, really?” Landis asks, gingerly stepping over the chain. It rattles a little as he lifts his other leg over, startling a nearby tree full of crows and sending them scattering off into the sky.

“Yeah. Fucking around in the park after dark is a time-honored tradition when you go to high school around here.” Otter shrugs. “There’s not that much else to do, I guess.”

Otter crosses the bridge, his silhouette vanishing into the darkness as he gets farther and farther away. As he reaches the large sign that marks the dirt trail into the woods, he looks back over his shoulder to Landis. “Coming?”

“Yeah,” Landis says hastily. “Coming.”

He makes his way towards Otter, cringing a little at each twig he hears snap underfoot. Stop being so twitchy, goddammit. Nothing’s happening here, just some kids throwing a weird party.

It isn’t long before they’re in the middle of the woods. The trees are packed together, the light from the moon blotted out by a dense canopy of thick, bare branches. It’s hard to see anything more than a couple feet in front of his face, and Landis stumbles over jutting tree roots more than once, swearing, barely keeping himself from falling in the dirt. We should have brought flashlights. What kind of idiot doesn’t bring a flashlight into the woods at night? We should just turn around and forget about this.

He opens his mouth to say as much, but Otter cuts him off.

“You good?”

“I can’t fucking see,” Landis grumbles. He can barely make out Otter’s shadowy figure waiting for him up ahead, and lets out a little yelp when something warm - not a tree branch - brushes against his wrist.

“It’s okay,” Otter says. He slips his hand into Landis’s after a little more blind fumbling, and squeezes it comfortingly. “I’ll grab you next time you fall. I don’t want you ending up with a twisted ankle in the middle of the woods. Then it’s on me to carry you all the way back to the car.”

Landis makes a noise that’s half laugh and half cough. “Y-yeah. Yeah.”

“Do you see that?”

Otter shifts, his free hand outstretched, gesturing towards something in the distance. Landis squints off in that direction, not so sure what he’s supposed to be looking at. Then he sees it - a flickering orange light. A bonfire? Otter tugs him towards it, ducking off the path and cutting through the forest. As they get closer, they can hear voices, at least four distinct ones, and see figures standing around where the light is. It might not be the right group of people, but it’s a group of people, inarguably.

Something’s not right here. Landis feels familiar anxiety churning in his stomach, and tightens his grip on Otter’s hand, practically digging his nails into it. He wants to run like a frightened animal.

“Landis!” A shrill voice that he recognizes as Aster’s calls out to him, and he cringes. “Is that you? You found us!”

“Yeah,” he says quietly.

He lets go of Otter’s hand and steps out from the trees, into a clearing that looks like it might be used for picnics during the day. Aster stands in the middle, next to the fire pit, waving enthusiastically. The two others from the diner - Tara, and the one Landis never got the name of - are on two of the logs placed in a circle around the fire, talking in hushed voices. And a fourth person is there, too, another face Landis recognizes from the diner. Not a customer, but a coworker. The short, chubby one with cat-eye glasses and freckles, who’s always nice to him when they work shifts together, and flirts with Austin whenever he comes in. It’s a little jarring to see her here, in a cheerful, floral print dress, next to the other three, still clad in all black. What the hell is her name? Jem or something, right?

She sees him looking, waves, and makes her way over to talk.

“Landis! I didn’t think you would come.” She leans to one side a little, her eyes widening when she sees Otter. “And you brought a friend!”

Landis feels his face turn warm. “Yeah. Sorry.”

“Oh, don’t be sorry! The more the merrier.” She smiles and sticks a hand out for Otter to shake. “I’m Genevieve, call me Gen. Landis and I work together at the diner.”

“Otter Redford,” Otter says, and Landis wants to kick him for using his real, full name. He reaches past Landis to shake Gen’s hand. “Pleased to meet you.”

Gen giggles. “Aren’t you a gentleman! Well, come sit down, we’ve just about got the fire going. Landis, you already know Aster, Tara, and Sparrow, I think?”

“Vaguely,” Landis mumbles. He sits down on a log near the other witches. Sparrow must be the one with the lopsided haircut, from the booth at the diner. They catch him studying them, and grin crookedly.

“Hey.”

“Hi,” Landis says back, a little inarticulate in the face of so much social interaction. He feels Otter sit down on the same log as him, a comforting, solid presence at his back, and plows ahead with the conversation. “You really come out here every weeknight?”

Sparrow rolls their eyes. “Not every weeknight. Some of us have night classes and jobs. But at least three days a week, usually.”

“And do what?” Otter asks.

“Well, we’re a witch coven,” Sparrow says dryly. “What do you think we do, knit scarves and talk about the good books we’ve read lately?”

This was a bad idea. The worst idea. Landis shifts uncomfortably, suddenly very sure he shouldn’t be here, in this place, with these people. As worst ideas go, this is going up there right next to killing your best friends on behalf of a fucking lake.

“So is it true your cabin out by the lake is haunted?” Tara asks, and Landis wants to scream, or sink into the earth, or quietly get up and leave, but he can’t decide which one sounds more appealing.

“Come on, Tara, none of that. I’m sure Landis doesn’t want to talk about it.” Gen comes to his rescue. There’s something shiny in her hands that she’s cleaning off on her dress, and her voice is still cheery, but she’s standing in front of the firelight and Landis can’t read her expression. “But now that he’s here, we can finally get started.”

Her hand is in the collar of Landis’s jacket before he can process it, twisting it so hard it almost chokes him and yanking him forward, off the log. For a moment he thinks Gen is going to throw him into the fire, and then he thinks, good, I deserve this, but she shoves him to the ground in front of it instead. Landis’s blood is rushing in his ears, but he thinks he can hear Otter scuffling with someone else, maybe the other witches, and it’s only once Gen is kneeling over him on the ground that he realizes the shiny thing in her hand is a knife.

“Sorry, Landis,” she says affably, and twists one of his arms up and behind his back. “It’ll only hurt for a second.”