Lis aand her bueatiful cat.

=Prologue=

October 31st 1996                                                                                          Somewhere in west Minnesota

  Luke Brown had never been a suicidal man.

  He walked slowly out of the cabin door and braced his barely covered body against the harsh October wind. He didn’t care about being cold, his dressing gown was enough. He could hear the incessant laughter of his friends (going to see your husband are you Luke? had been the last one) drowning out to the wind the further into the woods he walked. The gale force storm had battered most of the senses from him; his nose was filled with cold air and his ears with the incessant screeching. The only thing he could feel was the prick of the deteriorating rope he’d taken from the equipment shed. He looked up at the trees – all dead – and spun around, looking aimlessly into the sky. Some feeling had returned. His neck hurt.

  Why did his neck hurt?

  His head hurt too, just behind his eyes, he felt that his raw brain was being thrown against his retina. He screamed.

  “Why won’t it go away!?” It would, he would see to that.

  He stopped and looked at the tree to his right. It looked easy enough to climb. He threw the noosed rope up and it missed by a naked inch. He threw it again and the knotted end hooked over a branch. He pulled it and it stayed tight. Luke began to climb, branch by branch until he was standing 50 feet above the ground on a large branch.

  He jumped.

  The last thing Luke brown ever saw was the face of a small girl red with fear, screaming:

'' “Why won’t you go away?” ''

=Chapter 1=  November 12th 1999                                                                                      Somewhere in west Minnesota

 The Landrover rolled slowly up the drive way, it’s already mud splattered body work becoming even more so. Pete and Carole Hickman got out of the front doors and smiled each other, genuinely happy. The log cabin stood in front of them, apparently untouched by the harsh weather of Minnesota winters. The smoke which they presumed would be constant during their stay had ceased its upward journey from the stone chimney. Pete turned from his wife and trudged through the snow to the back of the car. Lisa Jane Hickman was only five and her mother had protested strongly to taking her hunting. Pete agreed and promised he would keep the hunting for him. The 17 hour journey from Stanton, Kentucky to the heart of Minnesota had rendered Lisa restless but on the final 20 minutes of the drive she had fallen asleep. Pete opened the door, unlocked her seat belt and shook her pink fabric clad shoulder lightly.

   “Come on honey, we’re here.”

   Her green eyes, still shadowed and covered by her long brown hair, fluttered open and she smiled at her dad. Pete raised his eyes questioningly and his five year old daughter nodded. She had been prone to night mares for a couple of years now, and every time she woke up, he asked her if she had had them. He didn’t even need to say anything anymore, just cock his head to the side and raise his eyebrows. The answer was always the same and Pete’s response was always the same.

   “Don’t worry about it hon, it was just a dream.”

   Lisa got out of her car seat and hopped out the Landrover, following her dad toward the house. Pete unlocked the cabin door and pushed it open. He turned to Lisa and asked her to go to help her mother with the bags. Walking back to the car, Lisa shivered and looked into the snow clad woods surrounding the cabin she would spend two weeks in.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   The bags were heavy but bearable, Carole took the heaviest ones and they the whole job took no more than 5 minuets. Lisa had packed her bright pink (safety) bag. Inside were about three bags of sweets – for special occasions – and a yellow hunting parka. The inside of the hunting cabin seemed strangely familiar

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify"> (''go away!”) ''

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify"> and she knew the way to her daddy’s room off by heart. She pushed open the door and inside was two beds, one small and one king sized. She smiled and walked further into the room, her surroundings were definitely familiar from somewhere, and could picture her Dad lying on the bed, hip to hip with her mommy, red in the face with concern, tiredness and genuine terror. She didn’t know why she thought of that and she laughed quietly to herself as she always did when she saw things not really there.'' ''

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">      She dropped her bag on the floor and walked back up to the main room, opposite the small porch and saw her parents talking softly to one another. They both had a small white plastic cup in their hands and it was fled with a black liquid. Coffee. Below and to their right the draw under the sink was open, where another two stacks of cups stood in plastic bags. Pete turned and saw her.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Hi Lisa”

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   He said warmly. She knew immediate they’d been talking about her nightmares, they did that all the time, and Lisa didn’t really care. In fact it made her feel better.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Hi daddy, I’m hungry, when’s dinner?”

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Not long hon, your mom’s got some beans on, you ok for beans and toast?”

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Yeah sure. Is the TV working?”

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Yeah, but it’s Freeview and no connection” Said Carole. Lisa was hardly spoilt, but Freeview and bad connection was something she’d never came across before. Her mam was right, the only cannels that worked were sports and CBeebies and even a five year old was too old for Third And Bird and Big Cook Little Cook. Pete sat down next to her and took the remote from her side. He switched back to the football, flicking past soccer, rugby and Ice hockey. Her dad watched about 2 matches a week of Football and Lisa, after five years of being stuck with it, had grown to like it, naturally she supported the local team, the Kentucky Wildcats and had even once gone to see them play the New England Patriots. This match was the Minnesota Vikings against the Carolina Panthers. She wasn’t in the mood for football today though. She was too tired. It was dark already and would be at this time (6 o’clock) for the rest of their holidays. Lisa had never been afraid of the dark.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   With her mam cooking dinner and Pete watching football -from which he rarely strayed- she slipped through the door of to the porch and into the warm ,dark November Minnesota night. The woods surrounded the Cabin perfectly, and in the penetrating darkness, Lisa felt completely cut off. The woods were full of dead pines, all caked in snow. The leaves they had routinely shed cracked under foot crisply

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">'' (he looked up at the trees – all dead – and spun around, looking aimlessly into the sky) ''

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   though some of them were soggy. The snow in the woods was more slush than actual snow despite the fresh blanket of it outside the house. The air, as a result, was a lot danker and colder. Lisa wasn’t wearing much, she had travelled the journey in her jeans and sweat shirt. The raincoat, pink and flowery was her mother’s idea. Wind in the area wasn’t too high, but bit into her arms like ice spears. She shivered with the cold and turned back to the cabin. Like the bedroom he parents were sharing, the path back to the cabin felt strangely familiar. Only… she felt she should be running. That seemed like a good Idea to her, she was far too cold for comfort. She picked her green wellys from the mud faster and faster, gaining speed. In front of her breath froze in the damp air and rose in front of her nose like smoke. Behind her she heard twigs snapping and leaves being kicked up.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   The cabin was warm and welcoming, as she walked down to the bedroom for the third time.

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=Chapter 2 = <p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">  The nightmares had been going for about 2 years, and had never amounted to anything serious. A few times she had woken up angry and once even said “yeah go tell that to your husband Luke” After she’d said it she denied she said it on purpose and Pete believed her. Lisa had never really lied. She didn’t have them every night, and she usually had some sort of premonition as to when she would have them. She didn’t notice it but Pete and Carole did. She usually went to bed at 7:30, but almost every time she had nightmares, she had gone to bed at exactly 6:35. They noticed it after the first few weeks of it. They ate dinner, a quick beans on toast with cheese, at 5:00 until 6:00, and watched they only show on CBeebies that Lisa liked, Charlie and Lola, until 6:35, at which time Lisa said she was tired from the car ride and left down the hallway for bed. Pete and Carole both looked at her understandingly and then once she left they both exchanged worried glances. The football had been uneventfull, the Minnesota Vikings had been trashed and even the commentation was poor. That took the evening to 7:00. That was when they checked in on her.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   Pete had to see it to belive it. He had never realised that people really could sleep with their eyes open. Lisa lay on the bed in all her clothes, coat and all. Her small frame was completey stiif. He right hand seemed to be gripping something. Pete stepped slowly forward.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Pete, we’d best not wake her.” Carole squeesed her husbands shoulder and he brushed it off lightly. At his approach, Lisa’s head craned up towards the head of the wooden bed and her eyes circled around. Pete took another step forwards and her mouth opened. She muttered something about going away and he looked questiongly at Carole, who looked back with concern and fear more than curiosity. It occurred to Pete for a second that Lisa could be messing with him and could be awake, that though dissapeared qiuckly though. Half through gut feeling and half because he knew she wasn’t like that. And besides, she was 5 for christ’s sake. Pete took a breath in and stepped frowards. He shook his daughters right shoulder lightly and she blinked awake. She smiled at him and nodded. Her hand moved slowly up to her neck and rested on the left side as if it was hurt. She shook her head and pulled her hand away.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “You went to sleep with your clothes on hon.” Carole was now standing next to him. She had lost all of the concern for her daughter she had previously felt.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Oh, sorry.”

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “No need to apologise, you were tired. Come on, your PJs are just here.” Lisa stepped out of bed and took her pyjamas. They were, like almost all of her possesions, pink. She shrugged off her coat and Pete held the clothes she took off. He dumped the pile on his and Carole’s bed. The fabric of the nightware had given her brown hair a small static chrage and it now stood almost on end and looked like a hologram, fuzzy and see through. She climbed back into bed and smiled at her parents once again.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “You sure you don’t want to stay up ‘til half 7, you can.”

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Yeah, I’m sure. Too tired”

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Ok, just call if you need anything.” Carole said as she leaned over and kissed Lisa gently on the forhead. Lisa had never been one for touch, but she seemed to forget that when she’d had nightmares.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   “Goodnight.” Pete noticed with genuin surprise that that was the first time he had ever heard Carole say that to Lisa. Carole Hikman ( born Carole Abrams ) had grown up in a family still very much pinned to the mid forties by a few old customs. Despite being born in 1968, making her 31, her parents had always seemed to unintentionaly get it across to her that women were of a lower social standing then men. Her mother would always let her father speak, would never make her own descisions and would take all kinds of bullying from Carole’s father. He would be extremly offensive about her cooking and she would take it and apologise, he would tell her to shut up and call her a stupid bimbo. If she told Carole off and Carole’s Dad didn’t approve, he would tell her to never mind what her mother said. Pete had seen that in their relationship from the very beginning. She was the least out spoken person he had ever met. Pete had talked to her about this numerous times and told her what she had seen in her childhood was unnacceptable now. Despite this, she always let Pete do all the activities with Lisa, taking her dancing ( once, she didn’t like it )playing dolls with her and tucking her in at night. He didn’t think Lisa’d ever noiced it though. It wasn’t as obvious as what he presumed it was like with Carole’s parents.

<p style="text-justify: inter-ideograph; text-align: justify">   Neither of the three slept well.

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= Chapter three =    Carole had bought the car she had now in anticipation of the weather 3 months before, enough time to get used to its immense frame. She pulled it out of the drive way and waved to Pete and Lisa, who were standing at the front door waving back. The back end rolled slowly off the uneven road and onto the strangely more even grass. She pulled the gearstick back and spun the wheel anti clockwise. The back wheels spun, the rear kicked back on to the road, now facing the right way and she drove out of sight of the pair.

The nearest shops took 2 hours 15 minutes to reach. Most of the houses, Carole observed, in Mahnomen were completely normal brick houses, whereas the house they were staying in was made of log and pritstick. SUPERVALU was huge, bigger than any shop she had seen in Kentucky; it had practically a whole different shop for the meat, the clothes, vegetables and the everything else. She reached into the left pocket of her Parka and unfolded her list: 10 tins of beans, 2 loafs of brown bread, beef ( in case Pete couldn’t kill any deer), tea bags, coffee beans, salt, carrots, lettuce, sausages, milk, gas, and vegetable oil.

“Right.” She said aloud, a little louder than she would have liked. The shop wasn’t long, everything was very easy to find and she was done, home and packing the fridge with Pete within 3 hours. Pete finished, looked over to where Lisa was watching Charlie and Lola, using it as escapism rather than watching it, and smiled at her. Lisa turned around just as he had left for the bedroom, to pick up his parka and the gun which he kept locked in the car. Not that the car was in their room, the keys were. He came back, walked down the corridor, and stepped into the cold, letting some of it in. At the same moment Carole breathed in through he nose, and cold air rushed in to fill her lungs, drying out the inside of her nose as it passed like frost over a pond. She saw Pete walk off into the woods

''(– all dead –) ''

with his Winchester 70 and a step ladder, a book, some ear muffs and a cushion. Although she had never been hunting before, she knew fine well he would sit on the step ladder with the cushion on top, put the ear muffs half on and read his book until he saw a buck, and then boom. They would have diner. Walking back over to Lisa she pulled the box for Spongebob monopoly from under the pile of wet coats and put it down on the large dinner table.

“ Lisa, you comin’ to play monopoly ?” She asked. They never played it with Pete on purpose. Because he would get too competitive and would always win. Carole thought it was nice to let Lisa win once in a while where as Pete thought she needed to learn about the real world. Lisa took one last glance at Charlie and Lola as it flicked to the adverts.

“Yeah sure.”

30 minutes later they heard a scream and a gun shot. They exchanged a glance across the table and stood up abruptly. Without bothering with shoes they ran to the back door where they could see where Pete was sitting on his step ladder, the gun lying in the snow clad leaves. Pete was hyperventilating but calmed as the pair rushed out onto the edge of the patio, not daring o go any further, in case their shoe-less feet froze.

“What happened?” Screamed a frightened Carole.

“Oh, nothing, I just thought I saw someone running and I pulled the trigger out of nerves. I… I should…” He sighed. “I’m fine you two go back into the warm.”

An hour later another gunshot resounded through the house. No scream though. Out the window they could see a smiling Pete, and a large buck 20 meters away from him, lying on the floor bleeding from the side of its head. It’s left antler was shattered and it’s eyes were wide open. The air stank of what she associated with gun powder but knew from Pete’s 2nd world war movies was cordite. She smiled at Lisa who grimaced back.

“I’ve got dinner!” Shouted Pete. This was one of the happiest times in Carole’s holiday because she knew it meant she didn’t have to cook dinner. Venison and soggy carrots, crunchy lettuce and tea was something Carole came to love over the week. Unlike nightmare’s. Incessant, dark nightmares. = 2 = Lisa had them every night they stayed at the cottage. Just like Luke Brown had done three years ago, at the same time Lisa’s nightmares had first occurred. Over the next two days, Lisa became increasingly terrified of entering the woods, screaming and crying. Screaming that “He died but he doesn’t go away!”

Pete all the time had remained sceptical. He thought it was a fear of the dark gone a little further, a phobia perhaps. And so it was his Idea to take her on a walk in the woods, past dark, to cure her fear. He was right. It had worked right from the moment they stepped into the woods. Lisa felt a lot better knowing that her parents were there and managed to convince herself it was just a dream. Right from the moment they stepped into the woods right up until the moment she fell.

Lisa fell to the floor with a scream and a thud. She lay there for a moment, unsure of what to do and then she ran. As she did the cries of her parents were drowned out

''(going to see your husband are you Luke?) ''

and she was alone, still running. She glanced behind her. The man had stopped. He stood there looking aimlessly up into the sky, wearing only a dressing gown. He shivered. His gaze settled on Lisa and he smiled. Lisa started running again.

“Go away! Why won’t you go away?” He was dead ahead of her. In the tree. He shivered again and he jumped out of the tree and something cracked violently. It wasn’t the branch. His face was still smiling. A small treacle of blood ran from his mouth and then he was gone. Lisa screamed and passed out on the cold wet floor.

=Chapter four= Lisa’s eyes fluttered open and she sat up. She wasn’t in the woods any more. She was in the cabin. In the living room the fire roared, heating up the whole cabin. Vivid memories of the night still swam around her naïve brain, flooding it with fear. She breathed heavily in. Across the room her parents lay in their bed, hip to hip, fast asleep. She stood up, stepped over her bag and lay next to her dad. She pulled the covers over herself and tapped Pete’s left shoulder. He turned around and stared at Lisa smiling. Lisa nodded in response to him raising his eyebrows.

“ Don’t worry about it hon, it was just a dream.” For the first time in three years, Lisa remembered her nightmare.

“It was worse than normal dad, I was running and this man was screaming at me and he was chasing me and he wouldn’t go away. I saw him die but he wouldn’t go away.”

“What do you mean you saw him die?”

“He jumped out of a tree on a rope and he snapped, why won’t he go away?”

“He will, because he’s not real hon.”

“NO, HE IS! HE DIED BUT HE WON’T GO AWAY!” She screamed, red in the face. Her mam woke up. And asked what was going on.

“HE DIED, HE’S DEAD, BUT HE DOESN’T GO AWAY DADDY, HE WON’T GO AWAY.” She screamed even louder, tears were now pouring from her eyes and she was shaking her head violently, her hair swishing over her face. For a second Pete saw stubble on her chin and her eyes blue. He face was a lot bigger and her teeth were black as she bellowed “GO AWAY, GO AWAY, YOUR DEAD, GO AWAY!”

Her parent’s faces were wrought with tiredness concern and genuine terror. They were the colour of what she saw pouring from that man’s mouth. Lisa stepped slowly off the bed, and calmed her breathing.

“ Lisa, no!” He parents both well aware of what her daughter intended.

She ran from the bedroom into the night. = 2 =    The night air was at a record low as Pete and Carole Hickman ran into the woods, barely managing to put on shoes. Ice was in the voices of the two as well as they screamed into the pitch dark night. Pete glanced down and saw his shins were scarlet with the cold. He presumed the rest of his body was too.

''(He didn’t care about being cold, his dressing gown was enough.) ''

They ran about the woods for two hours, screaming into the night, their brains making false calls of reply and luring them away. Then they found the grave. It stood next to a tree almost buried in leaves from three years of rest. A huge pine stood to its left, one of the lower branches was snapped slightly and still bore a knot of rope. The grave stone was black granite, shiny with the wet. It’s still clear inscription read…

LUKE BROWN, DEAR FRIEND AND WOULD BE FATHER, BURIED WHERE HE WAS FOUND.

Next to the head stone lay Lisa, curled up in a ball. Her pink Pyjamas were soaked with muddy water. Her eyes were wide open and staring at the floor. She looked up at her parents. Pete sighed.

“Lisa, get up, were going back to the cabin, now.” Pete didn’t say it to tell her off, he knew it wasn’t entirely her fault she ran away. He knew she was scared witless and had been hallucinating. Lisa didn’t respond. She only pointed to the huge pine tree. Both Carole and Pete looked up into the tree.

A man jumped, and hung swinging from the tree, his bleeding jaw locked in a gruesome smile. Carole screamed but he was gone. Pete became suddenly terrified as a video of Luke Brown’s life and where he was now played in his brain in a split second’s time. Carole had called the police an hour ago, because of their remote location, they should be arriving now.

“Lisa we have to leave, now!” Pete shouted and picked Lisa up by her underarms. Lisa knew what Luke was trying to do as well. The three ran. They had ran no more than 10 metres when Carole and Pete both instantaneously felt a thundering pain in their neck and they fell to the floor. They heard Lisa scream and then a man shout in joy. Luke brown had ripped Lisa’s conscious self from the inside and her mind had buckled to his. Lisa Jane Hickman had been dead for three years, however it was only now that her constantly fighting brain had completely given way to Luke’s. While her mind was still fighting it managed to keep Lisa’s physical form alive, but her conscious form had died the moment Luke Brown did. He had used her as a way to claw his way back from death.

Lisa was dead, Luke was alive again.

=Epilogue= As Luke ran off towards the cabin, the knotted rope swinging wildly in his hands the police arrived. Pete looked at Carole as she looked desperately at Carole. Luke had ran at the police screaming and swinging the rope like a mace. As he put his hand on Carole’s shoulder, Pete heard the crack of pistol fire and the scream as Luke crashed to the floor. Dead.

They drove home with the police that day, and after statements and all the police business, they returned to their beds. At midnight Pete woke up and looked contently at his wife. His heart jumped to his mouth and he burst out in tears for the first time in 20 years as Carole muttered “why won’t you go away?” quietly and she snapped awake hyperventilating.