Dolores (who went by Doe because no self-respecting 23-year old could go by the name Dolores and be taken seriously) had just wanted her last summer as a camp counselor to go smoothly. Things were looking bright for her future, she had just graduated with her art history degree and even though it was a notoriously hard field to permeate, she had scored a curating internship with one of the top art museums in the country, but she didn't start until September. So, she was spending this summer like all of her past collegiate summers, as a counselor at a sleepaway camp in the mountains, a place she loved spending summers when she was just a camper herself. As a counselor every year she was assigned cabins filled with sweet and obedient campers and she was usually paired to co-counsel with her best friend Rosie. It was always fun. That's how this summer was supposed to be too, but Rosie, also a recent grad, had landed a job at a big wig accounting firm with a starting salary that made both she and Doe salivate. Doe was glad for her, but it did put a damper on her own summer, and things only kept getting worse.
This summer Doe's assigned cabin was filled with a rowdy and messy group of girls and her co-counselor Krista refused to peel her eyes from her phone for more than forty seconds at a time, something that was not only against the rules for on-duty counselors but it also meant that she was too distracted to help Doe corral their campers.
Two weeks into the summer Doe had already reached her wit's end. Her campers were noisy and wild (more closely resembling a pack of rabid animals than a group of fourth-grade girls) and Krista still hadn't spoken more than a collective 27 words to either Doe or the campers. So late one afternoon on a day that had been particularly hectic, Doe suggested they choose an activity to get the campers to burn some of their energy. This plan backfired, however, when one of the girls suggested a nature hike instead of Doe's proposal to go swimming at the lake. The nature hike won the majority vote, beating the lake by a landslide. It was a tad chilly for swimming, but it had to be better than hiking, the forest that surrounded the camp was seriously creepy.
At the beginning of every summer, the camp owner warned the staff not to let campers wander down any of the forest's blocked off pathways. No one really needed reminding though, for years crazy rumors kept anyone from straying off the marked trails. Many years ago, even Doe herself had heard strange wailing coming from the woods during a late-night hike. The camp owners never elaborated on their warnings, so no one knew why the paths were blocked off but no one at the camp was very eager to find out either.
About an hour into their hike along the clearly marked and well-signed trail, Doe and her cabin were doing a lot better than she had expected. The campers chattered energetically among themselves and seemed to be having fun. Krista, who was surprisingly agile, sidestepping stones and avoiding bulging tree roots all while scrolling through Instagram, led the pack of girls. Doe followed along in the rear so she would easily be able to keep track of all the campers in front of her. As they walked, a brightly painted hummingbird flitted past one of the more distractible girls, and she ran after it, veering off of the marked trail down a smaller path to the right. Doe ran to catch her camper before she strayed too far.
Doe didn't think the girl was very far ahead of her but she quickly lost sight of where she had gone. In reality, the camper had come to a fork in the path and she chose the route to the left which led her back to the main trail where she caught up to the rest of the group, who hadn't noticed Doe's absence. When Doe came to the fork a few moments later, she paused with a nervous feeling in her stomach. The pathway on the right was roped off with bright caution tape but further down the forbidden route, Doe saw another bright bird flitting around a bush and, assuming that her camper might have been still pursuing the alluring creatures, Doe took a deep breath and ducked under the tape.
It seemed to Doe that she had only been on the path for a few minutes, but she was already disoriented and confused and she didn't see any sign of her camper, so she decided to head back to camp. She knew that from the main trail, camp was located to the west, but she wasn't sure what direction she was walking in now and she forgot her compass back in the cabin. The trees were more dense in this area and much less sunlight was able to break its way through, so she couldn't orient herself using the sun. She tried to trace her steps back towards the fork where the path started but none of the landmarks she passed looked familiar to her at all.
Funny vines Doe had never seen before would around the trees and hung from the branches. As she passed them, they seemed to grab at her bare arms and shoulders. They even began to drape onto the forest floor and the farther in this direction Doe marched, the thicker the vines got until she couldn't even see the ground anymore.
"Definitely the wrong way," Doe muttered looking around. She had never been in this part of the forest before and something about it felt strange like she was being watched, or like she wasn't alone. It was dead silent around her, no sounds of birds or squirrels or wind. Just complete unnatural silence.
The hairs on Doe's arms stood up and goosebumps coated her caramel-colored flesh. She didn't like it here. Whatever this place was it made her stomach twist into nervous knots. She quickened her pace to nearly a jog. Where was the path? How could she have gotten herself this lost? She scolded herself. Suddenly, Doe's hiking boot caught on one of the vines and she slammed to the forest floor. Thick green vines were everywhere but she couldn't tell where they were coming from.
Doe pulled herself to her feet but she couldn't walk, a vine had gotten wrapped around her ankle. She bent over to untangle herself but somehow the vine had gotten wrapped rather tight. As Doe tugged at the vines she felt them against her other ankle too. She whipped her head around to see the vines snaking themselves around her calf. She gasped and fell backwards onto her butt. When she landed the vines roped around her wrists and forearms. She tried to pull herself free but was yanked back towards the ground. As her head landed against the vines they snaked up and wound around her neck, not tightly enough to hinder her breathing but she could feel their pressure slightly constricting her windpipe.
