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Christopher Kloeble
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the creature was standing
up to its chest in the water,
scanning the opposite shore.
Then it slipped back into the
forest. Anni leapt up and
ran along the lakeshore,
dodging branches, leaping
over roots, but never taking
her eyes from the spot
where the creature had
disappeared among the
trees. When she reached
it, she heard a branch
snapping, followed the
sound as quietly as possible,
pressing deeper into the
woods, groping from trunk
to trunk in the half-light,
scraping her palms on the
bark, creeping slowly along,
then pausing to listen: the
tentative groans of the
trees, and beneath, her
heartbeat. Anni panted for
breath, coughed, stumbled,
tripped over a pine sapling.
Its needles fluttered. The
last sunbeams hung in the
treetops high above her, and
down below the shadows
were gathering. If our father
had been there, she would
simply have had to hold his
callused hand to find herself
home again: the forest had
swallowed him up every
morning, and every evening
spat him out again, often
with some sort of booty in
tow. Anni stood up, and set
her cap aright. “I know my
way around here,” she said
to herself. “I KNOWMY WAY
AROUND HERE JUST FINE.”
Ine-ine-ine! mocked the
pines.
The creature stepped out
from behind a tree not five
feet in front of her. It wasn’t
naked any longer, instead it
wore pants and a shirt and
a coat, like a man, and it