The Lodge

“Does everyone have their stuff on the bus?” One of the chaperones says while closing the back door. Every year our school goes on their annual ski trip,which if you ask me it is just an excuse for the adults to scare the students to death. “Ebony it’s time to get on the bus.” I tell her while grabbing my bag. “Okay, I just need to use the restroom first.” She calls to me as she makes her way towards the school. Ebony and her brother, Jude, have been my best friends forever. Seems how it is the last year we are able to participate. We decided, as a group, to come on the trip.

It’s been ten minutes and she still hasn’t returned. She won’t pick up her phone, I start to motion for her brother to come over. “Hey Vada, what’s up?” He says while looking around, “Where’d Ebony go?”

“I don’t know, she said she needed to go to the bathroom but that was ten minutes ago.” I say while picking at my fingers. “Have you tried her cell?” He says while trying not to sound nervous. Seconds later Jude’s phone starts ringing, “Well are you going to answer it?” I say eagerly.

When Jude answered the phone all you could hear was the sound of breathing, and after a few seconds the line cut out. But, before either of us could say anything about it he got a message;

Mom

Hey sweetie I will be bringing 

your sister to the resort.

Jude

Okay I’ll tell Vada, she was 

Starting to get worried when

Ebony didn’t come back. 

Mom

Love you! ☠️                   

“My mom said that Ebony will meet us there.” He says while trying to ignore the emoji his mom had sent him in her last message. I nod and start walking towards the loaded bus. We put our stuff in the back and climb in to take our seats. When we’re all on one of the adults take attendance and we start the hour drive to the resort.

Once we got to the resort we all went to our assigned rooms, Jude’s is right across from Ebony and I’s. The adults didn’t really have much planned, so we just waited in my room with some snacks. So far Ebony hasn’t shown up, we even messaged her and still no reply. “I’m worried , did your mom say anything out of the ordinary?” I asked Jude but he couldn’t even meet my eyes with his own. “JUDE!!”

“What, sorry I spaced out what did you say?” As he says this he fidgets with his bracelets.

“I asked if your mom said anything weird.” I repeat, him still not making eye contact. “Weird, no, nothing weird.” He says while holding a nervous smile, I just shrug and look at the game we are playing.

It had gotten late fast and we were both exhausted. Still no Ebony. Jude decided to sleep in Ebony’s bed until she got here so that I wouldn’t need to be alone. And he ended up staying the whole night because she never came. In the morning we all came down and ate breakfast. After breakfast we had the whole day to go out on the slopes, Jude and I are still kind of new to this so we stayed on the bunny slope all day. 

At the end of the day the adults started a fire that we all sat around. One of them started telling us a story about the Lodge we’re staying in, they said; This lodge was owned by a woman that went by Ms Collins. Collins was a nice young lady that cared deeply for her guests and staff. She would hold these competitions on the slopes that the guests could participate in. The winner at the end of the day would go into her office to have dinner with her. But, after that meal no one saw the victor again. Some believed that they went home the next day but, some thought that Ms. Collins had something to do with their disappearance. It has been said that every year while on this trip Ms Collins takes control over a student for the night to fulfil her duties as the owner of the lodge.

As the teacher is finishing their thought we hear footsteps walking toward us. It’s Ebony, she has finally arrived. But, she doesn’t look like herself, one of the staff members walked in holding a tray but, once his eyes met hers the tray drops to the floor and he speaks; “H-hi Ms. Collins.”