Chapter Text
The forest wasn’t supposed to exist.
Vanessa didn’t remember walking into it, didn’t remember choosing a direction. She was simply- running. Running as if her bones already knew she was prey. Cold night air sliced her lungs open with every ragged breath.
The ground was drowned in leaves- thick, heavy layers of them, wet from dew and rotting from years of being forgotten. Every step she took sank into them with a muffled crunch, like secrets being swallowed. The deeper she ran, the deeper the leaves piled, as if trying to bury the path behind her… bury the truth she had tried so hard not to look at.
Moonlight filtered through the twisted web of branches above her. It came down pale and sharp like broken glass, leaving slices of silver across her vision. Every tree she passed looked the same—tall, skeletal, reaching for her with crooked limbs.
Her heartbeat thundered louder than the wind.
Don’t look back, she told herself.
She looked back anyway.
William was right behind her.
So close she could see the gleam of his eyes- soft, calm, loving, wrong. His feet dragged through the leaves, collecting them like the forest wanted to pull him under too. But he didn’t stop. He kept walking, slow and steady, as if he were simply approaching a child who had wandered off.
“You are my daughter.”
His voice was gentle. Fatherly.
A kindness sharpened into a threat.
Vanessa stumbled, nearly falling into the bed of leaves. They clung to her shoes. They stuck to her hands. They tried to pull her down into the secrets she’d never dug up.
She kicked free and sprinted faster.
Branches whipped her arms. Roots clawed at her ankles. The whole forest felt alive—aware—pressing in on her with the weight of all the things she never wanted to remember.
She risked another glance.
William was still right behind her, no matter how far she ran.
Always one meter.
Always almost touching.
His smile was soft, tender, and horribly patient.
“Don’t you love me?” he called.
Her breath broke.
Leaves burst upward around her feet with each desperate step, swirling like dead butterflies. The ground seemed to pull at her, trying to keep her from escaping the truth she’d spent her whole life burying.
“You can't run from who you are.”
His voice drifted between the trees, echoing like it belonged to the forest itself.
She tripped- fell forward- hands tearing on brittle, decomposing leaves. The smell of damp soil hit her, earthy and choking. Something under the leaves felt solid, like a body waiting to be uncovered.
She scrambled up, panic flaring in her throat.
Still running.
Still running.
The forest thickened, branches like bars, shadows like cages. Her lungs burned. Tears blurred her vision.
Why wasn't it stopping? Why couldn't he leave her alone? Why isn't he gone? It was all her fault. She was abandoning him. Maybe if she turned around, this would all be over. He loved her. She should listen to him. He gave her so much. She should be grateful. She owed it to him. He gave her so many presents. She loved her aeroplane. She should be thankful fo all he provided for her. She should obey him. That was her purpose, was it not...?
“You will always be mine,” William said, so close his breath grazed the back of her neck.
She screamed-
and the forest swallowed the sound whole.
Branches snapped-
her vision collapsed into darkness-
and William’s whisper slid into her ear like a needle:
“Vanessa… come home.”