Free The Slender Man by Dexter Morgenstern

hesitate, because I don't know the answer to the question
off the top of my head. Wasn't it Turnpin? No wait.
    “Turpin?” I ask, although I probably should have declared
it.
    “That's the name of the judge Alyssa,” she says.
    “Did Shana write these essays?” asks Dad. He's glaring at
me, clearly not ready for any more lies. I just give him a look that says yes,
but without fully admitting it. He sighs angrily and rubs his forehead,
although you can tell he already knew the truth before I came in.
    “This worries me though, the implications here,” she
continues to my father.
    “What implications? They're just essays,” I protest. So not
only are they not fooled, they are worried about Shana now.
     “Alyssa, if you actually bothered to read a single one of
the seven pages of this essay,” Dad says snidely, “...then you would be worried
about your friend too.” He doesn’t know this, but I am worried about Shana.
    “We need to bring this up with her parents. Maybe get her to
a psychiatrist,” suggests Ms. Alder.
     “She doesn't need a shrink, she's just... venting!” I yell.
    “Alyssa!” shouts Dad. “Go home,” he says.
    I am about to turn around before I realize that I had a
reason for coming in here.
    “Dad, I need to see Shana. I told- I promised I'd head
straight for her house right after school,” I say.
    “Well that's not going to happen young la- little girl,” he
says, correcting himself with the term little girl in order to
condescend toward me, and it's working.
    “You're lucky if we even take you with us tonight after your
Mom finds out about your irresponsibility. Now get out of my face,” he
continues.
    I shrug, with a few tears about to fall. There are a lot of
things I want to say, but when my Dad gets like this, he won't hear any of it.
    “Probably already missed the bus,” I choke.
    “Oh, well I can give her a ride,” suggests Ms. Alder, but I
cut her a hateful glare. The last thing I want to do is accept a ride from the
woman who just sold me out.
    “Fine then, walk. Call me- from home, in one hour. When you
get home put your cell phone on my desk,” says Dad. I storm out of the office,
and slam it behind me. Some help he is. I walk down the almost empty
hallway, barely able to contain my anger as I exit the school. I head to the
forest line, but then stop. My hair is down, and I don't have anything to
contain it with, plus I'm wearing a skirt and some Chucks, and have no water.
I'm in no position to run, or even jog comfortably, and he expects me to be
home in an hour.  I sigh and move on. Let's hope I can walk through a few miles
of woods and get home inside an hour.
    As I enter the woods through the dirt trail, I hear the
crunching of leaves underneath my feet. It takes me a while to notice, but then
I finally stop and look. The trail is almost completely covered in leaves. Most
of them still have a little green in them. It's late spring though, and the
trees are supposed to be springing- or sprung with leaves right now. I look up
at the trees above me and am surprised at just how bare they seem. They usually
don't shed this vigorously until autumn, and even then the leaves are generally
dead and brown before they fall.
    “What's going on?” I say to myself. I continue on down the
trail, stomping on the leaves with my eyes pinned on the ground. It's taking me
much longer than I remember to follow the trail to the clearing. It must have
been years since I actually took the trail route home, so maybe my memory is
just foggy.
    After way more of my allotted hour than should be is spent,
I finally reach that sharp turn, and step off the trail onto my route. I march
forward, into the clearing and slip. The extra fallen leaves have hidden those
sudden slopes or roots I'm used to seeing out of the corner of my eye and
avoiding them. I don't get up instantly. Instead, I pummel the ground with my
fists in anger. I want to go see Shana like I promised, but she lives like