The hider in the hollow

The Hider in the Hollow

In the summer of 2005, four kids—Lila, Caleb, Mia, and Tommy—ran into the woods behind their small town to play hide and seek. The forest, known as Blackthorn Hollow, was a tangle of gnarled oaks and creeping mist, but the kids didn’t care. They were twelve, invincible, and bored. Lila was “it,” counting against a crooked tree as the others scattered, giggling into the shadows.

Tommy, the smallest, always picked the best spots. He’d vanish like a fox, leaving no trace. That day, Caleb hid in a ditch, Mia crouched behind a boulder, but Tommy? He was gone. They searched until dusk, shouting his name. The woods stayed silent. Police combed the hollow for weeks—nothing. No tracks, no clues. Tommy was a ghost.

The three kids grew up haunted. Lila moved away. Caleb drank too much. Mia stayed, staring at the woods from her bedroom window. They never spoke of Tommy, but his absence clung like damp rot.

Twenty years later, Caleb’s mother died, the last parent he had. He returned to the empty house on the edge of Blackthorn Hollow to settle her affairs. The woods loomed, unchanged, whispering in the wind. He avoided looking at them, but the memories gnawed—Tommy’s laugh, his quick feet, the way he’d promised to hide “where no one could ever find me.”

That night, Caleb drank whiskey in the dark living room. The house creaked. A floorboard groaned upstairs. He froze, glass halfway to his lips. Just the house settling, he told himself. But then came a giggle—high, childish, unmistakable. Tommy.

Heart pounding, Caleb climbed the stairs. The air grew cold, thick with the smell of wet leaves. In the hallway, a small shadow darted past, too fast to follow. “Tommy?” he whispered. The giggle came again, from his old bedroom. He pushed the door open. The room was empty, but the window was wide open, curtains flapping. On the sill, scratched into the wood, were the words: Still hiding.

Caleb stumbled back, breath shallow. He tried to leave, but the front door wouldn’t budge. The lights flickered, and in the dim pulse, he saw handprints on the walls—small, like a child’s, smeared in something dark. The giggle echoed, closer now, behind him. He spun, but no one was there. A cold breath grazed his neck. “Find me,” a voice whispered, Tommy’s voice, but wrong—hollow, like it came from underwater.

He ran to the kitchen, grabbing a knife, but the blade slipped from his shaking hands. The house seemed to shift, walls leaning inward. Outside, the woods beckoned, their shadows curling like fingers. He didn’t want to go, but his feet moved, drawn to the hollow.

In the forest, the mist swallowed sound. Caleb’s flashlight flickered, then died. The giggle came again, circling him. “Tommy, please,” he begged. A figure flickered between the trees—small, pale, with eyes too big, too black. It wasn’t Tommy, not anymore. It smiled, teeth sharp, and held out a hand. In its palm was Caleb’s old pocketknife, the one he’d lent Tommy that day, now rusted and caked with something dark.

Caleb screamed, running blind. Branches clawed his face. The figure followed, always just out of sight, its giggles now a chorus, echoing inside his skull. He tripped, falling into a clearing he didn’t remember. In the center was a tree, the counting tree, its bark carved with their initials—and Tommy’s, freshly etched, bleeding sap.

“Found you,” the voice said, right behind him.

Caleb turned, but no one was there. The woods went silent. He staggered home, locking the door, sobbing. The house was still. Too still. In the morning, he packed and left, never looking back.

The town still talks about Blackthorn Hollow. Kids dare each other to play hide and seek there, but no one stays long. Sometimes, late at night, they say you can hear a giggle from the woods, and if you look closely, you’ll see a small shadow, waiting to be found. But no one ever finds Tommy. And Caleb? He doesn’t talk about that night, but he keeps his old pocketknife locked in a box, and he never, ever plays hide and seek.