Bones
After careening off a mountain road in the midst of a brutal winter, Brandon is found and nursed back to health by a reclusive bear of a man. A man with secrets.
Excerpt:
Careful not to touch them, lest the man notice a change in their position, he limped the length of the shelf they sat upon to examine the array of specimens. He wasn’t knowledgeable of such things, but some seemed rather new. The word ‘fresh’ came to mind. Others appeared a bit older, with a handful giving the impression of being quite aged. Each were adorned with an etched design too hard to make out in the poor light. No matter what angle he viewed them, nor how much he squinted, he couldn’t determine what it was the man had carved into them.
Giving up, he decided to investigate other parts of the cabin. It didn’t take long to realize there was nothing else of interest to see, so he returned to his pallet - where he soon found his gaze wandering back to the shelf.
“Nope!”
He turned away to face the fire, but the flames did little to distract his burning curiosity. Within seconds, his head rolled back toward the bones.
“[Expletive].”
Struggling to his feet again, he first stopped to look for any sign of the man, then hobbled to the shelf. Taking a mental picture of its exact placement, he picked up one of the more intriguing pieces to take to the window. Holding it in the weak patch of sunlight, a face emerged.
“Huh.”
More curious than ever, he replaced the bone and grabbed another, which beheld a different face. Taking the chance with one more, he found a third.
The man had called them memories. Were they some sort of macabre photo album? If he had people he cared enough about to create their likenesses, why was he out here all alone? Brandon would give anything to be with his family and friends again.
Author's Note:
A rare thing for me, this story popped fully formed into my head. I found it rather unsettling and tried on many occasions to deviate from its path, but my characters refused to change course.