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Chapter 1: Heather

The sun had been down for a while and as supposed to be a great trip to the Appalachian Mountains with friends had turned into a ly deserted road Even the radio had given up on ht between bouts of static for a brief enre I hated if it kept me company and reminded me I wasn’t alone in the world Each push of the radio’s scan button brought a little bit of hope, but it wasn’t long until the static started again and the music was drowned out

“Co” I tapped the radio and hit the scan button again

My cell phone was dying and I hadn’t even thought to pick up ht I would find the cabin I was searching for long before it ran out of juice It wouldn’t have helped anyway because the reception was so badcircle indicating it was searching for satellites, but it always ti was found

Ugh

I cranked the heater up another notch and tried to peer through theon ht, but the cold outside wasit harder to defrost as the teainst the darkness and tried to see with the abys to produce in the falling snow Mostly I just got a reflection of snow that see in sheets instead of flakes

Yeah, this is bad

The situation was going to turn frouide me back to civilization I wasn’t even sure where I took a wrong turn I tried to renal went out, but I hadthe way The road stretched on, naled that the end offast

“Please, just a bar A half a bar? A quarter of a bar?” I picked up nal but I was stillit into airplaneup a distant service tower, but it went right back to zero bars when I told it to search for a cellular signal

Driving around in the dark untilto help the situation and there was nothing for miles that I could see It certainly didn’t help that my vision was fairly obscured by the frost onin front ofas I thought about my situation

A road?

I pulledbehind et a lay of the land and see if I could sonal if I wasn’t confined to my car My coat did little to protect hts with n of service I was met with a constant row of eed me further into the darkness

“Co teeth

I heard noises in the distance and felt fear creeping up my spine It was cold, but there were still wild animals out there, especially in the mountains I turned towards my car and quickly ran back to safety

Yeah, forget that

Exiting and entering the vehicle had broken the war froo and blew into er see hts It wasn’t like anyone was going to see them anyway

What in the world a to do?

Somewhere in the distance, further up the mountain, was a cabin filled with some of my closest friends It was supposed to be a party far from civilization, a party that lasted several days My friends were probably already drunk, and rightfully so I would have been doing the sa the darkness and starting to panic

I wasn’t sure how longthere with the heater going, but I was certain it wasn’t going to last the night I had no idea if the road I got lost on was traveled or if I was going to be stuck there until I eventually froze to death

I peered out every , looking for souide ht I saas the reflection of theoff of the snow around otten started late, I would havewould have been fine I silently cursed my terrible sense of direction

“Drive until I run out of gas or sit here and hope sorily “I’m too far down this road to just turn around”

It was a risk either way I could get ten as I had left if the screen on my dash was correct, but I had no idea if ten miles would put me any closer to safety If I just stayed in one spot, I would be able to last a lot longer, but I was gale to tellto rely on my own intuition because I was certain I shouldn’t be trusted to decide my fate in a life or death situation like the one I was in

Nature seemed to make the decision for me as I realized exactly how tired I was The adrenaline of the situation was starting to wear off and the coffee cup intime

If I was going to be forced to walk, doing it in the daylight see to do it in the dark, and I seeet bad weather Friday night, but the rest of the weekend was supposed to be clear If they were right, I would only have to battlecaht, or until I was found, so I tried to make myself comfortable