transcript

Speaker 1:
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Speaker 2:
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Speaker 1:
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Speaker 1:
[01:54] The idea of your child being taken from you, their life and health now completely unknown to you, that is one of the most powerful human nightmares one can imagine. In this story titled, Something in the Mountain Stole My Sister's Baby from an Anonymous Cinder, shook me to my core, and I'm very happy to share it with you. You'll be gritting your teeth, shouting at the characters to do this, do that, hoping for a good ending. But you'll walk away from this story scared, knowing that sometimes it isn't human hands that take us away in the dark. My sister vanished for less than two minutes on a mountain road. When she came back, her baby was gone. This is what happened. My sister got out of the car. I looked away. I looked back and she was gone. But when she came back, we found out her baby was now gone too. If you asked the sheriff's office in that county, they would tell you there was never any evidence of an abduction. They would tell you my nephew was missing for 47 minutes and that we were both just panicked. Weather and darkness made us unreliable witnesses, they said, that we likely misremembered part of the sequence because of stress. I don't blame them for thinking that. I would think that too if somebody else told me this story. Thankfully, my nephew is four now. He's healthy and loud. He loves blueberries, monster trucks, and playing the exact same song until everyone in the room wants to die. He's real. He came back real. But there's something else that is real, too. Something I do not have a name for, except the one my sister used later, when she was finally being honest with me. Borrower. I'm ready to tell my story. My name is Aaron. My sister was 29 then, and I was 33. Her son Theo was 10 months old, and had just figured out that Peekaboo was his favorite game. We weren't on some doomed trip or going somewhere dramatic. We were actually doing our normal thing. Kate, my sister, had been having a rough first year with Theo. She wasn't a bad mother by any means. She was a good one, in fact. An exhausting, hypervigilant, underslept, deeply loving mom. Theo had colic for months, though, and then ear infections. Then a sleep regression that nearly flattened her. Her husband, Dan, had started a new job with long hours and was gone a bit too often. Poor Kate had been living on cold coffee and adrenaline, basically. Whatever you call the feeling you get, where your whole body is operating three inches above panic. I lived about two hours from them. I came over whenever I could. I held Theo so she could shower and I stocked her freezer. I'd clean bottles too. I probably didn't do as much as I should have, I do admit. The truth was, Kate and I had spent most of our adult lives loving each other in a careful sort of way. I mean, we could laugh and celebrate things. We would even help each other if something practical needed doing. But there was one hard old thing between us that never fully scarred over, and everything else in our relationship had learned to grow around it. When Kate was nine and I was 13, she went missing for half a day in the North Carolina mountains during a family camping trip. People said she had gotten turned around near the creek. That was the official family story. But the truth was, we had gotten into a fight over something stupid. And I mean so small and stupid, I can't even remember what it was. My best guess was this bracelet, if I remember right. But anyway, I do remember that I was a mean and passive aggressive 13 year old girl. I had told her to stop following me everywhere I went. I remember her face when I said it, and unfortunately I felt satisfied that I'd upset her. I left her crying near the trail spur that led down to the creek. When she did not come back, nobody knew at first that she had gone toward the water. Because I'd lied about it. I said I thought she had gone back to camp. By the time I admitted I'd seen her near the trail, we had already lost too much time. They found her six hours later, nestled into some bushes above the creek bank, soaked all the way to the bone. She was shivering so hard she could barely stand. She wouldn't speak that night. She barely spoke the next day too. She had scratches on the back of her legs and mud all over the front of her shirt. It looked like she had been crawling on her stomach. She had one shoe on too. She said almost nothing about what happened, except one sentence she told her mother three days later, when she thought I was asleep in the motel room. Mom, I heard you calling me out there, but not where you actually came from. That statement lodged itself into my mind forever. Our parents did what they thought they had to do, and that turned it into a family wound that was never fully discussed. I was watched more closely. Kate was treated more gently. Nobody said, Erin, you lied and your sister nearly died. Nobody said, Kate, tell us exactly what happened. By the time we were adults, the Creek incident had become a stale object in the room. Everybody knew where it was, but nobody touched it. So when Kate asked if I wanted to do a weekend cabin trip with her and Theo because Dan had to work and she was desperate to be someplace that was not her own house, I said yes, and it actually sounded fun. Of course, part of that was for her and the rest was for Theo. I adore that kid. I was thinking I could show off my more helpful side, more than usual, that that might clear the wound, so to speak. The cabin was outside blowing rock, up in the mountains, but not deep off grid remote. Two nights and it would be cheap because it was shoulder season and it would be raining all weekend. We packed too much, diapers, wipes, bottles, backup bottles, purees, extra pajamas, three different kinds of pacifier, the portable sound machine, a travel crib, and Kate's breast pump. Even though she almost never used it anymore. We left a little late. You see, Theo had a meltdown right when we were trying to load the car. Then he fell asleep the second the tire started moving. By the time we got into the mountains, evening had folded in. We had one of those warmish spring rains that looked worse in the headlights than it actually felt. Not a downpour at all, just steady rain that silvered the road, making all the branches around us look black. Traffic was light too. I was driving because Kate was too tired. Plus she could tend to Theo without worry. We had the music on but very low. Theo was sleeping in the back in his rear-facing seat, cheeks round and flushed from a late nap. His little dinosaur print sleeper zipped to the chin. He had one hand curled around the ear of his stuffed rabbit. Every now and then Kate would turn and use the tiny mirror clipped to the headrest to look at him. She would do that thing new mothers do where they checked a baby who was actively sleeping just to confirm he even still existed. She caught me smiling at her once and rolled her eyes. Oh, don't start, she said. I didn't say anything. You had a face. It was a fond face. It was an annoying face. We were good for most of that drive. Not magically healed, of course. We weren't about to be movie version sisters overnight, but it was an easy drive. We made jokes, argued mildly about whether we should stop for fast food or just make grilled cheeses when we got there. Kate explained that Theo had recently discovered he could fake sneeze for attention and was overdoing it. At one point, she looked out at the rain coming down the dark slope beside us and said, You know, I forgot mountain rain smells different. It did. Even through the vents, you could smell wet stone and leaf. Is that a real thing? I said, or are you entering your Woodland mother era? She smiled without looking at me. I'm being sincere. Don't punish me for it. That was another thing about us. We could be fine for long stretches, then hit some invisible wire and stiffen back up instantly. I eased off. No, no, you're right. It does. She nodded. A little later, after we passed a dark overlook and a gas station with one flickering sign, she said, do you ever think about that camping trip? I was surprised by the question. I kept my eyes on the road. Which part? She gave a short laugh with no humor in it. That probably answers it. I should have said something else. Something like I thought about it more than she ever knew, then say that I was sorry again. But I didn't. Instead, I did what I often did when the subject came up. I focused on the funny or joyful parts. I think about how mom kept using that Coleman stove even after it nearly took off her eyebrows. Kate snorted despite herself. That did happen. And dad insisting he knew where every trail led. He never knew where any trail led. I thought maybe I'd steered us out of it, but then she said quietly. I thought about it when Theo was born. I glanced at her. Her face was turned toward the window. Rain moved and warped lines over the glass and across her reflection. You do? I said. She nodded. I think becoming somebody's mother changes the scale of things. Not necessarily in a better way. Just makes it different. There was too much in that sentence for me. And guilt began to rise up again. I get it, I said, though I really didn't. No, you don't. Trust me when I say that when she said that, it didn't come off as cruel. I tightened my hands on the wheel. True, I probably don't get it in the same way you do. Kate leaned back and folded her arms, immediately looking sorry. I didn't mean it like that. Yes, you did. I meant that I think about what it would feel like if he went missing for six hours. What that would do to me. That's what I meant. I smiled and said, I know. Theo made a small complaining sound in the back and settled again. The road narrowed into a long curving stretch. There were no houses visible or porch lights in the distance, and I couldn't see any other cars. Just wet black road with guard rails in certain places, drop offs and others. The rain was skimming through the beam of the headlights. Kate uncrossed her arms after a minute and rubbed her face. I'm sorry, she said. I'm sorry too. It's stupid. No, it's not. She was quiet again. Then she said, I didn't want to start a fight. We're not fighting, girl. We always do this. We get close to fighting, then someone says they're wrong. Then we both pretended it didn't happen. It was quiet for a second. And then I said, I should have told the truth faster that day. Kate stared straight ahead. Yeah, probably, she said. I'm sorry about that. I really am. That's when the car hit whatever we hit. It wasn't a big impact. No violent jolt, no cracking metal. And we didn't go fishtailing. It felt more like driving over something. There was a dull, soft thump under the front passenger side, then a bump under the wheel well. I instinctively braked and the car slid just enough on the wet road to scare me. I corrected, eased onto the narrow gravel shoulder, and put the hazards on. Theo still didn't wake up. Kate sat up straight. What was that? No idea. Was it a branch? I don't think so. We both looked through the windshield, searching for an answer, as if it would be out there still sitting in the rain. The shoulder was barely wide enough. On our right, the woods rose steeply up from the edge of the road. On the left, beyond the wet line of the asphalt, there was a shallow ditch, then a slope down into thicker dark. Rain ticked on the roof, while hazard lights flashed orange over the trunks. I'll check, Kate said, already unbuckling. No, you don't have to do that. You hate looking at roadkill. True, I do, but... And Theo sleeping. She had already grabbed her phone. She pulled her hood up, then looked back at the rear seat. She made that automatic soft face that she saved just for him. I'll be ten seconds, she said. Take your time. She gave me a look. Not literally. Then she opened the door and stepped out into the rain. I watched her through the windshield as she moved around the front of the car, her phone flashlight cutting a hard wide circle across the wet road. She crouched once near the passenger side door, then stood up. She moved farther ahead, maybe following something I couldn't see in the headlights. Rain pelted her, making her shape seem to stutter with each step of the wipers. I turned halfway in my seat to check on Theo. Now, he had woken up as soon as Mommy left the car, of course. But he wasn't crying, just aware and awake and looking around. The little mirror showed one eye and part of his forehead, so I twisted more and looked at him directly. Hey, Bug, I whispered. His face brightened the second he saw me. He loved being noticed. His mouth opened in that gummy grin that made him look perpetually delighted by your existence. Your mom's out there getting rained on, I told him. He kicked once in his seat. I covered my face with both hands. Where's Theo? He waited, tense with anticipation. I dropped my hands. There he is. He squealed. He kicked again and grabbed at the straps with both hands. I did it one more time, because I love that kid so much. Where's Theo? I covered my face. He made a little breathy laugh. Before lowering my hands, I looked back to the windshield. Kate was gone. I couldn't find her anywhere. She had been there seconds ago, but now I couldn't even find her light. Don't panic, I thought. I leaned forward over the wheel, peering through that side. The wipers swept back and forth, and the hazard lights flashed. No Kate. I glanced to the passenger side window, expecting to see her crouched below sideline. Nothing. I looked in the side mirror, and still nothing. Kate? I called. Not too loud. I didn't want to scare Theo, and I wasn't even sure if this was a real problem yet, but it felt painfully familiar. There was no answer. Theo made a happy noise behind me, and I almost snapped at him from my nerves. I hit the unlock button without thinking, then realized that meant nothing if I stayed in the car. My mouth had gone dry. I checked the dashboard clock. I remember it saying 843. I called again, louder this time. No answer. Obviously, it probably didn't help that the windows were rolled up and the doors were closed. I rolled my eyes at myself, then rolled down the nearest window. Cold rain blew in instantly. Kate! My voice hit the trees, then died. There was still no reply, no sign of her phone light. I listened as closely as I could. Maybe the rain drowned it out, but it wasn't coming down that hard. However, I could not hear even the sound of her movement. I remember looking ahead through the windshield again, seeing my own face reflected pale over the trees. Theo laughed from the back seat. I could have cried just hearing it. I hit the horn once, a short panicked blast, then again longer when there was no response, and still nothing. I probably should have called 911 right then, but I knew we'd been losing service on and off for the last 20 minutes, and the thought didn't even come to me before something stranger did. I felt, suddenly and intensely, that I needed to get to higher ground. Not as in leaving the car or walking away, but to just stand up, to look over the hood, over the roofline, and I can't even explain why. To this day, I don't know why that feeling came over me, and this isn't me being dramatic. It was just all at once, involuntary. So I unbuckled. Theo made another little sound. He wasn't upset yet, thankfully. Shh, it's okay, I muttered. I opened my door and put one foot down on the wet, gravel shoulder. Rain hit my bare forearm. The air smelled like mud and hot engine. I stood with one hand still on the doorframe, leaning up over the roof, stretching to see both up the road and down into the dark on the other side.

Speaker 4:
[21:41] Kate!

Speaker 1:
[21:43] I called out, but it was useless. Second step out. I was not about to leave my favorite little boy in the car alone, or even get too far from him. At the time, I figured I just needed some air. Standing up and staying in the open door seemed fine. I scanned the trees, breathing a little too fast. The woods on our side of the road were thick, with mountain laurel and young pine trees. Rain had turned every branch so slick. Water moved in the ditch beside the road with a soft running sound, like a suddenly sprouted creek. It almost sounded like whispering. Then from the passenger side, a little ahead of the hood, Kate stepped out of the woods. This episode is sponsored by Quince. This time of year always makes me rethink what's in my closet. I'm trying to keep fewer things and keep the better ones. Pieces that are well made and easy to wear all the time. That's why I keep coming back to Quince. The fabrics feel elevated, the fits are thoughtful, and the pricing actually makes sense. Quince makes high quality everyday essentials using premium materials like 100% European linen and their insanely soft flow knit activewear fabric. Their men's linen pants and shirts are lightweight, breathable, and comfortable. Basically the perfect layer for spring. The pants strike the right balance between laid back and refined, so you look put together without trying too hard. And their flow knit activewear? Moisture wicking, anti-odor and soft enough that you'll actually want to wear it all day. The best part is that their prices are 50-60% less than similar brands. How? Quince works directly with ethical factories and cuts out the middlemen. So you're paying for quality, not brand markup. Everything is designed to last and make getting dressed easy. My wife and I are both Quince converts at this point. I've been living in these linen pants, and she keeps stealing my flow knit shirts. The quality just keeps surprising us for the price. Refresh your wardrobe with Quince. Go to quince.com/unexplained for free shipping and 365-day returns. Now available in Canada, too. Go to quince.com/unexplained for free shipping and 365-day returns. quince.com/unexplained.

Speaker 5:
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Speaker 1:
[24:45] I jerked so hard, I slammed my shin against the door. I was close enough that I should have seen her approach by then, but I hadn't. One second she was there and the next, she was stepping through the line of dripping branches with her hood down, hair plastered to one cheek, bone in hand. What are you doing? She said, like I was the weird one. I stared at her. Where in the hell were you? She looked genuinely baffled for half a beat. Then her face changed. I had to pee. What? She gave a small embarrassed shrug and held up one hand. I got out and then once I was already out here, I realized I really had to pee. I didn't want to say it because you would have made fun of me. I almost laughed from the sheer wrongness of it. Are you kidding me? Shhh, don't wake him. She hissed reflexively, glancing toward the back seat. I've been yelling for you. Well, the rain is loud. And I laid on the horn. She frowned. Well, I didn't hear it. I looked at her phone. The flashlight was off. Why is your light off? It was reflecting in my eyes. That made no sense, at least not to me. And judging by the look on her face, she didn't think it made sense either. You vanished, I said. I did not vanish. Well, you were there, and then you weren't. She looked past me into the car, then every trace of irritation left her face. Erin, she said. I turned. At first, I didn't understand what I was seeing because my brain supplied the missing shape automatically. Rear-facing seat, gray straps, blue blanket, stuffed rabbit. But then everything that was wrong faded back in. The straps hung open. The blanket was half down. The rabbit was on the floorboard, and Theo was gone. I remember making a sound I'd never made before, a pathetic and terrified little whimper. Kate lunged past me so hard she nearly knocked me off my balance. She yanked open the rear passenger door. The interior light, which had faded, came back on. The seat was empty. No, she said, already crying. No, no, no, no. She began to claw at the seat as if he might be underneath it somehow. She grabbed the blanket, the floor mat, the diaper bag. She looked under the front seat. She looked in the footwell. She unbuckled the entire car seat in three shaking motions, pulling at it uselessly, like the baby might have slipped behind it. I stumbled around to her side. He was right here, I said, which was the stupidest sentence I'd ever said. Of course he had been right there. That was the problem. He wasn't there anymore. Kate screamed his name into the road. Theo! I grabbed my phone and looked at the screen with shaky hands. No service, maybe just one bar flickering and then gone. Kate was half in the car and half out, breathing in broken grasps. Did you take him out? Did you take him out? No. Did you open the back? No. Her face snapped toward mine. There was an accusation in that look. Blame. Anger. We have to keep looking, she said. We need to call 911. There's no service out here. Then we drive until there is. And leave him here, she screamed. That shut me up. She was completely right. I wasn't thinking straight. If there was any chance, any stupid, impossible chance, that he had somehow been taken by a person on foot or managed to get himself out. Every second mattered. We both started searching at once, frantically. We checked under the car, the nearby ditches. We ran our lights over the shoulder and into the brush. Across the road, under the guardrail, Caped kept calling his name. I called too, even though I knew he wasn't going to come to his name. He was too young for that. The rain made everything harder. Ground detail washed away the second you noticed it. The headlights threw shadows, and those hazard lights were becoming strobes. And then, I found his pacifier, three feet from the open rear door. It was standing upright in the gravel. Didn't look like it had fallen there. It looked like it had been placed. I froze and looked at it. The plastic ring hung to one side, and the rubber nipple was pressed down into the gravel, just enough to hold it. Kate? My voice came out so thin. She came around the car and saw it, and she stopped. For one second, we both simply stared. Then, from the woods below the road, we heard Theo crying. It was unmistakable. It was that breathless building wail that babies do. Theo's voice. Kate was over the ditch line before I could even grab her arm. Theo! She slid on wet leaves and caught herself on a sapling. I followed, nearly falling. We scrambled down the shallow slope under the beam of our phones, branches whipping at our faces. Then, the crying stopped. Mid-wail, cut off so abruptly, I thought for one insane second that he had been smothered. We both stopped, too. Did you hear that? I whispered. Kate turned toward me. Rain and tears mixed on her face. He's down here. The woods below the road were dense but not wild. Think steep mountain understory. Slick rocks and normal woods. I could hear water moving somewhere nearby. Probably a runoff creek. Theo! Kate shouted. For a moment, there was only rain. But then the crying started up again, farther in. Not much farther either. Maybe thirty yards. Kate made to run and I caught her hard by the elbow. Wait. She ripped against my grip. What? My mouth had gone numb. I didn't know what I meant to say until I heard myself say it. There's something wrong. She stared at me like I was crazy. Of course, something's wrong. We have to find Theo. No, I mean something is wrong with all of this. Her brow furrowed. She actually agreed. There had been something off about this entire situation from the start. Why was I possessed to stand up in the car? What possessed Kate to abandon us on the road? None of this was normal. Kate suddenly looked around, and when she looked back at me, there was sheer terror in her eyes. What, Kate, what's wrong? She shook her head too fast. We just get him and we go. You know something? Another cry sounded closer now and somehow muffled. Kate squeezed her eyes shut for a second. When she opened them, she said, When I got out, I thought I saw someone standing in the trees. I felt the hair rise on my arms. What somebody? I don't know. Why did you never tell me that? Because I wasn't sure what I saw. I saw movement and I went toward it. Then I realized where we were. I actually laughed from the stress just once. Where we were? We're on a road. No. She shook her head again. I mean where we were. The baby cried again. I wanted to run to him. I looked at her, then at the black weave of branches ahead of us, where the cry had come from. Kate, we need to go. Her voice dropped. This is close to where it happened. When we were kids. I stared at her. What? She pointed up slope blindly toward the road. There used to be a campground off one of these roads. Not right here, but close enough. I recognized the creek bend when I got out. My mind snagged. There's no way you recognized a creek bend from the passenger side in the rain. I did. The one time you were lost here was 20 years ago. I know. Her voice frayed. I know that. I still recognized it. Feel that out a longer cry. Kate whispered. We have to keep him in front of us. What does that even mean? She swallowed. When I was little, I told Mom I heard her calling me from the wrong place. That memory snapped back. I remember that. I told her. I'd never told her the rest. A cold pulse moved through me. It had nothing to do with the rain. The rest of what? She looked into the woods and answered without looking at me. It wasn't her I heard first. The crying started again to our left now. Impossible unless someone was physically moving with him through brush. Kate flinched toward it. I moved with her. Just tell me while we go. We pushed through the undergrowth carefully and as fast as we could, going even faster when we heard the cries. Branches dragged water down our collars. Mud sucked at our shoes. Every few steps I had to grab something to keep from slipping. Kate kept talking in a strained voice. She sounded scared. I heard a baby crying back then. I looked at her sharply. Back when you got lost? She nodded. That day, I was mad at you. I was crying and I heard a baby somewhere down by the creek. I thought that maybe there was another campsite close by, and I could find a grown up to help me, so I followed it. That detail was so weirdly sensible, it made the rest worse. I followed it for a while, she said. I kept thinking I was close, then I started hearing mom call my name too. Not from camp, but from the same direction. I remember that part the best, because it scared me even then. Mom didn't sound afraid. She sounded patient, like I was annoying her and she wanted me to hurry up. The crying ahead of us snagged on a note that sounded like Theo right after his vaccinations, right before he really got wound up. Kate was nearly in a run now. I grabbed her by the shoulder. Slow down. She shook me off but did not speed up. I found this place under some bushes, she said. Not a cave, but more like where the roots had made a pocket under the bank. I remember seeing a white blanket there. A blanket? She nodded. Something was crouched over it. I never saw the front of it. I don't know if I did and my brain cut it out or if it never turned enough. It looked wrong from the back and narrow, too narrow, high up. There was movement down low like it was kneeling, but not on knees. What did that mean? I wondered. The woods around us seemed suddenly full of things crouching just out of sight. I began to feel jumpy. What did it do? I ask. It put one hand on the blanket. That's all I remember cleanly. A hand. Then mom, our real mom started to call for me from behind. Not in front anymore, behind me. Ahead of us, the crying shifted downhill. Kate turned and shouted, Theo. Instantly from somewhere deeper in the trees, her own voice shouted back, Theo. We both froze. The copied sound was not perfect. There was something underneath. Neither of us could move. Rain pattered through leaves. Water ran somewhere nearby. Then from farther off and lower, a third cry came. No words. That was Theo, unmistakably him. Kate grabbed my wrist so hard it hurt. Don't answer anything unless you can see me. What? Don't answer unless you can see my face. Why, Kate? Just trust me. I couldn't argue with her, not right now, so we kept going. The ground steepened. The trees thinned briefly around a washout where rainwater had cut a gully through red clay. We slid down the edge and crossed it. On the other side, something blue was snagged on a branch at shin height. One of Theo's socks. Kate made a sound through her teeth. The sock was wet and muddy at the sole and inside out. I know he was wearing both when we left, she said. I knew he was too. I'd helped wrangle them onto his fat kicking feet after his last diaper change. The crying came again much, much closer. We pushed through a group of bushes. So dense, we had to turn sideways in parts. The leaves slapped wetly against our jackets. The branches around us were smooth and pale under the bark. They looked like disgusting arms. That's when the woods began to trick us. That's how I'm going to describe it, because otherwise it's very difficult to understand. But basically, I would hear the creek on my right and then on my left, even though I hadn't shifted direction. I would glance back and be sure the road should be visible upslope, but only see wet black trunks. Even my phone compass spun and corrected and spun again. And the baby cries, they seemed near enough to touch, but then suddenly very far away. A couple of times I thought I saw a pale cloth ahead, and it was only the underside of bark. Once I thought I saw Theo's round head just beyond a cluster of branches, but it wasn't him. I don't know what I was seeing. Kate stayed very close to me. One time when I slowed, I thought I heard movement behind us, and she grabbed the back of my jacket, hissing, No, forward. Did you hear that? I heard you a second ago, from where you weren't. I'm right here. I know, and it didn't come from you. I gulped. We came out at a narrow creek fed by runoff from the road above. In daylight, it would have been nothing. A quick rocky ribbon of water shinned deep at most, moving briskly over slick stone. In the rain and dark, it looked all black and metallic. One side of the bank was cut steep, and on the other, it opened into a muddy shelf under a leaning hemlock. Theo was crying from the far side. We both heard the same thing this time. Kate sloshed straight in. I followed. There was no other choice. Water hit my ankles and it felt like solid ice. My shoes skidded on algae-slick rock, and I nearly came down. Kate grabbed a branch, lurched forward, and lost it, catching herself with both hands in the creek. But we picked ourselves up and kept going. By the time we scrambled up the opposite bank, the crying had shifted again. Not far, just farther down the creek. I wanted to break something. Is someone moving him? I said. Kate didn't reply. We found a rabbit next. Theo's rabbit. The stuffed one. It was sitting on a flat rock under the hemlock soaked through, one ear pinned by rain. The thing is, that rabbit had been on the back floorboard when Kate reappeared after Theo had been taken. I'd seen it. I knew I had. So how had it gotten here? Kate bent down and picked it up with both hands, as if it was Theo himself. She looked at me and I saw the first edge of hysteria on her face. What if this is my fault? She clutched the rabbit to her chest. What if it recognized me and came back? The rain ran off her chin. Her hair was pasted to her neck. She looked wrecked and childlike at the same time. Kate, what are you talking about? When I got out of the car, I saw something move and I knew. I just had that feeling. Instead of saying anything, I lied because I didn't want to sound crazy. And now Theo's gone. Kate, it is not your fault this happened. How do you know? I just know. We're gonna get him back. I took the rabbit from her before she could shred it in her fists. Something splashed upstream. We both whipped our lights around. We didn't see anything just yet beyond black water. Then Theo's laugh. Not a cry, but a laugh this time. Who or what was he laughing at? He sounded very delighted. From under the bank to our right. Kate made a broken sound, dropping to her knees in the mud, shoving aside branches that had rooted into the creek edge. I grabbed her jacket and followed. There was a hollow under the bank, maybe where floodwater had carved into the clay. It wasn't very big, barely enough room to shove an arm into. It smelled of wet soil and old rotten leaves. And way in the back, where the light barely reached, something white gleamed. Kate plunged her hand in up to the shoulder. What is it? Is it Theo? I said. She pulled out Theo's sleep sack, the spare one from the diaper bag, not the one he had been wearing. We both stared at it. I know that sounds impossible too, but there it was. It looked like it had been zipped, rolled, and damp only on the outside. Like it had been carried, not washed downstream. There was a packet of wipes tucked inside it. Kate started shaking her head so hard, I thought she was going to make herself sick. Oh my God, it got in our car. She whispered. I got chills again. What was this thing she was talking about? Was there something out here with us? Something that wasn't a person? Whatever had taken him had not snatched him from the open woods. It had reached into the sealed, ordinary space of the back seat of a parked car while I stood only feet away. And I never heard a thing. Maybe it really wasn't a person. That realization put a new shape on the dark around us. The woods felt even less empty. I forced myself to speak. Kate, we need a rule. A real rule, something we both do right now. She swallowed. Okay, so we do not separate, not even two feet. If one of us stops, we both stop. If you hear me and can't see me, ignore it, just like you told me, remember? She agreed. And if we find Theo, one of us gets him and the other watches everything else. Okay, she said. We began to move again, following the creek, as that was where the sound kept circling. At one point, the ground opened up into a muddy deer path that curved toward what looked like an old drainage line, maybe a remnant from roadwork higher up. Concrete jutted through the bank farther ahead. Pale and slick. As we walked, Kate talked in bursts, Do you remember any of Nana's old mountain rules? I shook my head. Well, she told me old mountain women had rules, superstitions and stuff. Don't whistle after dark and don't throw bathwater after sundown. Don't leave a cradle on a porch in storm season. I thought it was all old lady nonsense. She laughed. She called them the borrowers. I was going to be sick listening to this. Did she say what they were? I asked. Kind of. She never described them that clearly. That should have meant something, but when you're a kid, you think adults are just being spooky to scare you for fun. She pushed a branch out of the way and kept going. She said they wanted what still belonged, partly to the world they came from. What does that mean? Did she say how to stop one? It took her a while to answer, but eventually she said. She said they're cowards. They wanted what you could be tricked into giving them. That made me feel even more cold. Ahead of us, the path dipped under a tangle of roots and came out a narrow concrete culvert. What must have once been an older piece of road. It was bigger than the average pipe, not quite upright walking height, but enough that an adult could crouch through it. Water ran shallow along the bottom. Wet moss furred the concrete lip. The darkness inside was total beyond the first six feet. Theo's cry came from within it. This time, there was no doubt.

Speaker 4:
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Speaker 4:
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Speaker 1:
[49:29] Kate ran for the opening, but I seized her again. Wait. I can hear him. We don't have time. I bent and picked up a fist-sized rock from the creek edge. I tossed it underhanded and soft into the culvert. It wasn't big enough or thrown hard enough to hurt Theo, but it would piss him off if it hit him. But that wasn't the point. This was something I had to do. The stone clanged against concrete once, twice, then skittered farther in, soon splashing and vanishing into some water. For a second, nothing happened. But then, for much deeper in the pipe than the size of it should have allowed, something moved. I heard weight shifting on the concrete in this rapid, uneven pattern, but it didn't sound like feet or paws. It was fast. Several impacts very close together, and then complete silence again. Kate went white. Tell me you heard that, I said. She nodded without looking at me. Theo gave a choking sob from somewhere inside. We stood in the rain at the pipe mouth, our lights aimed in, both breathing too hard. Then from behind us and uphill, our mother's voice called, Erin. I turned before I could stop myself. There was nothing on the slope, but rain and trees. Kate grabbed my hand and gripped it hard. What's wrong? I said. She shook her head. She was looking just above my shoulder toward the creek behind us. We then heard my voice from the water line saying, Kate, over here. We both absolutely heard that. My sister grabbed the front of my jacket with one fist and practically dragged me backward until we were pressed shoulder to shoulder against the culvert wall beside the opening, not in front of it anymore. Her nails dug through the fabric. We don't turn around no matter what we hear, she whispered. Inside the culvert, Theo began to really cry, a full-bodied cry, furious and terrified. That snapped us both out of whatever paralysis had gripped us. We have to go in now, I said. Kate looked at the culvert, then back at me. Me first, okay? No, it's tied farther in. I'm smaller. Let me go first. We're the same size. I'm smaller. It was true, but by barely enough to matter. But this was about letting me do it. Letting me lead the way to be the one at most risk. Fine, she said. But I keep the light on you. I do not look away. You get them and turn right back around and we go. Got it, I said. She took off her hoodie and shoved it at me. What's this for? For your arms. She began to wrap the hoodie around my forearms like makeshift padding, in case there's glass rebar in there. It was such a mundane sisterly thing to do in the moment that I almost cried. I crouched at the opening. The culvert smelled strange. Some sort of new animal smell I wasn't used to. Theo was crying from somewhere ahead and a little to the left. The sound echoed. Kate steadied the light over my shoulder. I can see the bend, she said. A bend? What bend? There's a split or something ahead. Just go. I crouched lower and stepped into the water. It was calf deep and shockingly cold. The floor was slick with algae and grit. My shoulders nearly brushed the sides. Rain drummed on the ground above in a muffled sheet, and Kate's light stretched my shadow thin ahead of me. About ten feet in, the pipe widened slightly and forked around a central concrete support. Not really a true fork, but more like the main channel had been widened around an old pillar. On the left side, just beyond the support, the beam caught pale fabric, Theo's blue blanket, and beyond it, on a dry ledge above the waterline. Theo, himself, he was sitting upright. His hands were free, one fist pressed into his mouth. His face was wet and red from crying. He saw the light and wailed. Oh my god, I breathed. I lunged forward. But then something clicked in the darkness behind the pillar. A small, wet click, sort of like tongue against teeth. I stopped so fast, I slipped and had to catch myself on the wall. Theo reached toward me with both hands and screamed. The space beyond the pillar was dark except for the edge of Kate's flashlight beam. It didn't reach fully into the recess behind the ledge. I could smell that strange animal smell from here. Erin! Kate called from behind me. She was much further back. Her voice echoed too. I can see him! Oh God, please get him! I took another step. From the dark behind the ledge, something exhaled. Not very loud. It was a close, damp breath. I knew with awful certainty that Theo had not simply been left there. He had been placed there. I felt as if I had been lured. I should have bolted forward anyway. But the second I understood something was within arm's reach behind that ledge, my body rebelled. I hesitated. Then Kate shouted from behind me, sharp and furious and desperate, Now, Aaron! That's what I needed. That made me move. I splashed the last few feet and grabbed Theo under the arms. The second I began to lift him, the thing behind the ledge moved. I never saw a whole shape. I saw something fill space in my peripheral vision. Something pale and jointed, sliding across the opening behind the blanket, and very, very fast. A hand or something hand-like, pressed against the concrete edge. I saw nails or claws, some sort of long hard tips, clicking once on the wall. Theo suddenly shrieked in my face, and I turned instinctively, shielding him against my chest. Something touched the back of my calf. A touch, slow and cold. I kicked backward as hard as I could, slamming my shin into concrete. Pain burst from my leg. I stumbled through the water, with Theo clutched to me, one of his legs trapped awkwardly under my arm. He was screaming directly into my ear. Behind me in the culvert, that thing began to move low and fast through the water. I ran. Kate's light jerked wildly, as she ran for the entrance too ahead of us. She made it and made room at the entrance. Erin! I came out half crawling and half falling, nearly knocking her over. She dropped to one knee in the mud and grabbed Theo's sleeper, then my shoulder, pulling both of us out of the pipe mouth and into the rain. Go, she said. I didn't need to be told twice. We ran. We thrashed uphill, getting caught and scraped up by branches and bushes. All the while, Theo's heel kept knocking against my ribs. Kate slipped a few times. I lost a shoe in the mud and jammed it back on without stopping. Behind us or maybe beside us, I kept hearing movement that never stayed where I tried to place it. Once, very close to my left ear, something whispered.

Speaker 7:
[58:08] Give him back.

Speaker 1:
[58:10] I ignored it. I kept hearing Theo crying farther ahead of us, even though I was holding him against me. That nearly broke my mind. I started to veer toward the sound before Kate slammed into me and shouted, No! We had the rule, remember. Stayed together, by force if not by sense. At the creek crossing, Kate went first. I shoved Theo higher against my chest. She got across and turned to help me, both of us panting and soaked. The whole way up from the creek, I expected a hand to grab me from behind, or some weight to drop on me from above. I was so scared that I would look down to find Theo no longer in my arms. If something impossible had happened once tonight, why not again? So I held him so hard that he probably didn't like it too much. Sorry, sorry, sorry, I kept saying into his wet hair. By the time we saw the orange pulses of the hazard lights through the trees, I thought I might pass out. We burst up the ditch and onto the road shoulder like wild animals. The car was exactly as we left it. Driver's door open, rear passenger door open. For one stupid second, I thought we had made it. But then I looked at the roof. There were three muddy handprints above the passenger side, stretched in a line toward the back seat. These were not human handprints, because humans did not have fingers that long. Kate saw them, too. She made a quick whimpering sound, then clasped her hand over her mouth. Get in, I said. I yanked the rear door open wider, while she held Theo against her shoulder. He was still screaming, his whole little body rigid with terror. I tore the strap straight with hands that barely worked. Kate shoved him toward the seat, and I forced his legs into place, buckling one side, missing the other. Swore, then tried again. I got the chest clip shut. He kept reaching for us desperately, so panicked, snot running down his face. The second he was strapped in, I slammed the door. In a second, Kate was diving into the passenger seat. I rounded the hood, and I fell into the driver's seat, dragging the door shut and hitting the locks. And I instantly turned to see Theo. He was still there. The key missed the ignition the first time I tried it. Come on, Kate whispered. I jammed it in and turned it. The engine rolled, but died. Something tapped twice on the rear windshield, and we both froze. There weren't any branches nearby that could have reached us, and there were no other people out here. Then came another tap. High on the glass. Theo stopped crying for one terrible second, sounding like he had caught sight of something. The weight above us shifted. Something was on the car. Kate turned halfway toward the back, and I caught her arm. It's okay, I told her. We're getting out of here. I turned the key again, and this time the engine caught. I threw the car into drive. Tires spun on the wet shoulder and water sprayed behind us. We fishtailed a bit, but we shot back onto the road just fine. I refused to look in the mirror. I kept my eyes on the black ribbon ahead of us and drove until the trees thinned out, and the first bar of service came back on my phone. Kate called 911. By then she was crying so hard, the dispatcher had to keep asking her to repeat herself. Baby taken, baby recovered, mountain road, please send somebody, just send someone where there are lights. We met a deputy and an ambulance at a gas station about 20 minutes afterward. Theo was cold, muddy, had a scraped ankle, but was otherwise perfectly fine. The sheriff's department said it was a combination of panic, darkness, weather, maybe a person in the woods we never got a clear look at. Sometime near the morning, while Theo slept against her chest in a hospital recliner, Kate finally told me what she had never told anyone about the day she went missing when we were kids. That the thing she found crouched in the roots by the creek. Already had something wrapped in white. That thing, it takes babies. I apologized to her properly for the first time in my life, and I cried. Two weeks later, I was at her house helping with dinner when rain started tapping at the kitchen window over the sink. Theo was in his highchair, smashing avocados into his tray with both hands. The house smelled like garlic and soap, and it felt so good to be back to something ordinary. But when he looked up at the dark window and began to laugh, Kate and I both turned and my heart froze in my chest. He slapped both hands over his eyes and said, Peek-boo. He waited there for a second, smiling behind his fingers, like somebody was waiting on the other side of the room. Then he pulled his hands away and laughed even harder. Kate crossed the kitchen in three steps and yanked the blind shut. Theo cried, because the game had ended. Well, I'm happy that story had a good ending. This one was one of the more stressful stories I've read. Because if someone's baby goes missing, then I end up hoping and praying by the end of the story that everything works out okay. Probably because I'm a parent myself. And if a borrower took one of my kids, I'd probably borrow the heart right from its chest. Good night. Thank you so much for tuning in to this episode of Unexplained Encounters. I've been your host, Darkness Prevails. Follow and rate Unexplained Encounters on your favorite podcast app, like Spotify or Apple Podcasts. And if you need more scary stories read by me, you can find more of my narrations on Tales from the Break Room, also on your favorite podcast app. Till next time, everyone, stay safe out there and stay creepy, because this world is a strange one.

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