Pregnant With Alpha’s Genius Twins – Chapter 213
We walk for hours that day, until night starts to creep in on us. We’re lucky, actually, that it’s a mild February and that we’re not racked with cold. Still, despite the nip in the air, I feel the sweat pouring off me beneath my jacket.
This worries me for two reasons. One, because I’m almost sure that my sweat is a fever, rather than the reaction to the exercise. And two, because I’m sure that this will increase my dehydration, and our water levels are limited until we can find a fresh source.
“This will do,” Victor says, eyeing the darkening sky as we enter a clearing. I’m grateful, again, for his experience that knows what to look for in a good campsite instead of a bad one. To me, this looks just like the hundred other miniature little clearings that we’ve passed in the past few hours.
our bags to set up camp.
to their “collection.”
he could barely carry. Luckily, Victor put his foot down on that one.
me, starting to stack sticks for a fire while I
ay, giving him a smile. “And you?”
symptoms. I wonder, passingly, anxiously, what we’re going to feel like in the morning. Every day it seems like we wake up worse.
is hospital bed. I settle that memory in my mind and focus on gratitude instead of fear.
ing over to me a I finish popping up the tent. He holds out a handful of acorns. “I found these for dinner, do you think we can eat them?”
– survival is his duty.” With that, I snap open one of the flat little bed rolls, working to get some fresh air into it. “I’m just here to make the beds.”
ood that he’s warming over the fire, “we’re not quite there yet. Plus, you have to boil acorns first, and that’s a waste of water at the moment.”
rs at my side, then, wordlessly helping me take the bedrolls into the tent and set t
d I looking anxiously around at the darkness that surrounds us.
ook out into the woods expecting horrible things to burst from it.
in, breathing on the back of my neck?
out some of his times in the Navy when he had to camp out with his buddies, as part of training or missions. Their talk fades from my mind as I stare into the darkness over the top of the fire, my plate balanced in
arkness – like a whisp of smoke on the air.
ze that I’m looking into the smoke of the fire, which I must have imagined…
“Are you all right?” Ian asks, lo
hen, and realize that they’re all staring at me.
ugging. “I have an overactive imagination, which likes to tell me to imagine things that aren’t th
id you see a ghost?”
ries out here to scare me. Besides, there’s no such thing as ghosts.”
t they’re all over this forest –“
realizes his mistake. Alvin quickly shovels food into his mouth, filling it so he can’t say anymore.
y two boys at this interaction. What on earth was that?
face stark.
ean by that, Alvin?” Victor
mouth is full.
not getting out of it now.
ing to draw patterns with his fingers.
tes ago while he was telling his stories.
ear-empty plate. “We don’t want to tell you if it’s going to scare mom
at?” I say, leaning forward, starting to
tance, in the darkness, that slow movement, like smoke twisting through the air. Except now, I see, it’s not smoke from our fire – it’s…brighter. More decisive in its movements in the air. First taking one shape, holding it, and then diffusi
ser.
ing my plate as I look around. Victor spins, tense, looking out into the woods himself. And I can see him pale as he begins to see what I see.
, slipping his hand into mine and looking up
h,” Alvin says, his voice guilty. “
ed, my whole body rigid, I look
nything – to be curious about us in the middle of the woods!”