Page 82 of Pick Me Up On Tuesdays

The universe was testing us. That was the only explanation for why everything kept going wrong.

Mia dropped our only good camera into a river.

Max fell again (he really needed to stop trying to act cool near cliffs).

Ethan almost got pecked to death for trying to flirt with an eagle.

And then there was me—standing still, staring at a distant hilltop, because I swore I saw something.

It all started as a normal trek—or, well, normal by our standards. Mr. Dax had passed out in the bus with headphones in, trusting us to “collect valuable footage” while he “rested his eyes.” Classic.

Mia, who almost always had the camera, tripped over a rock and launched it into the river like a tribute to Poseidon.

Silence. A perfect three seconds of stunned disbelief.

Just like that we knew we were screwed.

Max, attempting to lighten the mood—or maybe trying to impress Shun, whom they were in bad terms by the way—climbed a nearby boulder and struck a pose. “Nature bows to me!”

Nature immediately rejected the offer. His foot slipped, he tumbled down with the grace of a pancake, and we all winced as he landed in a thistle bush.

Ethan, meanwhile, spotted an eagle perched dramatically on a tree and took it as a personal challenge.

“Hey, gorgeous,” he said, finger-guns aimed at the bird. “You fly solo?”

The eagle responded with the fury of an apex predator who had just been catcalled. Feathers flew. Ethan screamed. Somewhere in the chaos, he lost a shoe.

And yet, despite all that noise, despite the absolute sitcom-level of disasters happening around me, I felt it.

A pull.

I turned away from the chaos and looked up toward the hill. The air felt... thicker there. Like the light bent differently, more reluctant to touch that patch of earth.

At first, I thought it was just a tree.

Then it moved.

Just a twitch. A ripple in the shade.

I squinted.

There—eyes.

Faintly glowing. Watching.

I blinked, and it was gone.

But it left something behind. Not a footprint. Not a whisper. Just... presence. The kind that clings to the back of your neck, cold and coiled.

He was out there.

He was watching.

My stepdad.

The memory hit like a punch to the ribs—shadows too tall in the hallway, a creak on the stairs at night, the way his smile never reached his eyes. The monster wasn’t gone. Just quieter. Just waiting.

Somewhere beyond the hill.

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