The Grip of Aunt Mae

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window.

My great Uncle Charlie brought it up when my mom sent me over with some summer corn. I put two paper bags full down on his kitchen table.

“Do you want me to husk any?” I asked, and he took me up on my offer, joining me at the table. I pulled off the stiff husks and picked at the fine silk. As we pulled apart a few ears for his dinner, Uncle Charlie dwelled on the light he’d seen.

“I been seeing it every night for three nights through the woods there. Some years back, some squatters came through. I mean, cabin’s not mine, but I don’t know who’s out there at night. I got a right to know, don’t I? I’m gonna go over there. You want to come?”

I didn’t, and I thought my Uncle Charlie could take care of this himself. But it had always been hard to say no to him, and now that he walked with the jerks of aging joints and looked at me through thick glasses, I said I’d go. He hobbled out of the kitchen and came back moments later with a hunting rifle.

We paced through the thick wood as the summer sun descended, casting shadows that reached east across our path in sharp, contrasting strips of darkness. The brush and leaves crunched beneath our feet, announcing our arrival long before we reached the cabin to anyone who might be listening for us. It was a one-room cabin, probably someone’s hunting cabin at some point. The outside had been painted red, but the years had faded it to not much more than a shade of woodland with a red hue. The roof bent in, moss and leaves and rot coating the outside and its tiny porch. The porch, which was soft to step onto and bent under our weight, led us to its only door. Beside it was a lonely window through which I assumed my uncle had seen the offending candle that had brought us here.

My uncle rapped on the door. “Anybody in there?!” Silence followed. I looked around. No voice responded, but silence in the woods is odd. Forests brim with critters and plant life that bristle all the time, a ceaseless and surprisingly loud cacophony if you pay attention to it. But the wood seemed to fall eerily silent, listening with us for a response. My uncle didn’t seem to notice as he pounded on the door again.

After a few more knocks my uncle decided to push open the door. He put his shoulder into it, but it swung open surprisingly easily. It was sticky in its frame from years of rotting while closed but seemed to have never been locked. A strange sound emerged as the door swung open, almost like a gasp. Inside the air was dank and hot. There was a long picnic table, covered in dust and pine needles, a woodstove, and some lopsided chairs pushed up against the back wall. A few mounted antlers hung on one wall.

We took a few steps and looked around. Nothing. No candle. What’s more, the coat of dust on everything suggested that nothing had been touched in a long time.

It was getting dark. “Maybe whoever was here had a lantern or something,” I suggested, suddenly eager to leave. “Seems they took off.”

“Suppose so. Well, hope that’s the last of this.”

We left, my uncle pulling the door into its sticky frame. As we stepped off the porch, a surprisingly cool wind blew. It cut through my clothes and I shivered. We started our trek back to my uncle’s, the woods darkening around us. We were halfway back when my uncle stopped and turned back.

“What in the -” he didn’t finish his thought, and as I turned to look my stomach turned. Clear as day, a candle burned in the window of the cabin. The flame burned brightly, flickering in its mesmerizing motions. Its lively dance contrasted gravely with the feeling of fear it instilled in me.

“I’m goin’ back.”

I started to object but my uncle had already set off. “Uncle Charlie,” I called after him. My body was filled with dread. I knew my uncle could take care of himself but I sensed danger. I suddenly felt desperate. “Please - maybe we could call the police and let them check it out?” I called after him.

He chuckled over his shoulder and called, “That’s what your Aunt Mae said.”

I froze. My Aunt Mae had died three years prior.

I couldn’t seem to move my body as I watched my uncle barrel toward the cabin. Around me, the wind whistled. I couldn’t see very far around me in the dark anymore and I felt vulnerable from every angle. My body started shaking. My breathing was shallow and quick; I tried to take deeper breaths.

I watched my uncle shoulder his way into the cabin again. I couldn’t hear anything he might be saying because the wind had picked up violently and the sound of the leaves drowned out anything else. The candle in the window went out.

The woods suddenly fell quiet. Silence followed. My body stopped shaking. I waited.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. “Now what has my Charlie gotten himself into?”

Suddenly my feet were moving and I was running, running as fast as I could. In my first steps, the hand tightened its grip then tore off as I pulled away.

BOOM. I heard a gunshot. I ran back past my uncle’s house, got in my car, and sped out his gravel drive. I floored the gas pedal for a few miles, afraid to look in the rearview mirror, until I got to the point in the road where I knew my phone would get cell service. I pulled over and called the police. I told them my uncle had gone to the cabin in the woods by his house and that I’d heard a gunshot. I gave them his address and told him the cabin was southeast of his place. My body was shaking again and my breathing was ragged.

I drove home. When I opened the door, my mom could see that I was a mess. “What happened?” She asked. I tried to explain, but it came out a lot like what I’d told the police.

“I’m going over to check on him,” she said. I repeated that I’d called the police, but she insisted she’d go. “You just try to relax. There’s some corn and trout in the fridge.” She pulled on a sweatshirt and headed out, starting the car I’d just parked.

I didn’t want to be alone but in the comfort of the house I’d grown up in, I sank into the couch, covered myself in a blanket, and turned the TV on to distract myself. Sitcom reruns flickered on the screen for an hour or so as I focused on breathing deeply and replayed what had happened in my mind.

Sooner than I expected, my mom came in. She seemed thoughtful, perhaps puzzled as she put the keys on the table and stripped off her sweatshirt.

I sat up. “Is Uncle Charlie ok?” I asked.

“He’s fine…” she stated tentatively. “He was asleep. I woke him up when I knocked.”

I was dumbfounded. “And the police?”

She shook her head. “There were no police there.”

I put my head in my hands. What had happened? What was happening? My mom kept looking at me. Finally, she asked, “Did you eat?”

I shook my head, and she went into the kitchen and brought me the plate from the fridge. She sat by me on the couch, still eyeing me curiously. I didn’t know what to say. I picked at the fish and all but ignored the corn. The longer we sat, the more uncomfortable I felt, so I got up and announced that I was going to bed.

I left my light on all night and hardly slept. Each time I dozed off, I heard a gunshot or felt someone touching my shoulder and sat up, alert and covered in cold sweat. By morning I was exhausted and my head hurt.

When I emerged from my room, coffee was brewing in the kitchen. My mom sat in her nightgown. She beckoned me to sit with her and offered me a cup of coffee.

“Tell me again what happened last night.”

“Mom, I don’t really want to…”

“It just worries me, baby,” she said, “You know your Aunt Mae used to tell stories like that.”

“What?”

“You know. She used to say things happened to her. Before we knew she was… sick.”

I sat silently, shocked that she was comparing me to Aunt Mae. Finally I sputtered, “It happened. I saw it all, felt it all, it - it was real.”

She nodded. “It’s just… your Aunt Mae would say the same thing.”

The emotions of the night seemed to cascade into anger. After all I’d been through, she was suggesting that I’d imagined it? That I was going insane? I stood up. “It was real!” I declared, and stormed into the bathroom.

I took off my pajamas and started the shower. When it began to steam I stepped in and let the hot water run over me. I felt my body start to relax. In a few minutes the previous night seemed to wash off of me with the water, swirling at my feet before slipping down the drain.

I stepped out of the shower and wrapped myself in a towel. The mirror was clouded white with steam. I set about drying myself and my hair. In a few minutes, as the steam on the mirror began to dissipate, I took a deep breath and looked at myself in the mirror. My own dark, knowing eyes looked back. I knew what I’d seen. I heard the gunshot. I felt the hand -

I glanced down at my shoulder. My heart skipped a beat. A deep, purple bruise had formed, in exactly the shape of four fingers gripping my shoulder. On my back shoulder blade, a thumbprint.