The Whistling Trail
Crosswind’s Red-Eye Horror #008
The first morning he ran because he couldn’t sleep.
The cabins were still dark when he stepped outside, the lake barely visible through the trees beyond the retreat grounds. The air carried that cold, damp feeling that only exists right before sunrise, when the world hasn’t fully decided to wake up yet. Somewhere farther down the row of cabins, someone coughed once and then everything settled again.
He stood on the porch for a moment stretching his calves while the quiet slowly took shape around him. During the day, the property felt open and familiar enough. People moving between the lodge and the lake, conversations drifting across the gravel paths, the normal rhythm of a weekend retreat. But early in the morning, before anyone else was awake, it felt much farther removed from everything else than it had the night before.
Someone had mentioned the running trail after dinner, a loop that circled the lake and cut through the woods before reconnecting near the cabins again, so he followed the small wooden signs past the lodge and into the trees.
At first it felt good just to move.
The trail was soft under his shoes, packed dirt and pine needles damp from the night air. Thin gray light filtered through the branches overhead, not enough to fully reach the ground yet. The deeper he got into the woods, the cooler the air became.
It wasn’t eerie.
Not at first.
Just quiet in a way most places never really are anymore.
He settled into an easy pace and let the run clear his head the way it usually did. That was part of why he liked running early. Nobody needed anything from you yet. No schedule. No conversations. No pressure to be anywhere except wherever your feet happened to be landing.
The whistling started somewhere off to his left.
Not close enough to startle him. Far enough away that at first his brain folded it naturally into the rest of the woods before separating it back out again.
Just a few notes.
Soft. Casual enough to sound human.
He glanced through the trees while he kept running, expecting to catch sight of another runner farther down the trail. That was the obvious explanation. The loop was big enough that he probably wasn’t the only one using it that early.
The whistle came again a few seconds later.
Similar to the first one, though not identical in a way he could’ve described afterward.
He listened to it for another moment before it faded behind him.
That should have been the end of it.
The second morning, he heard it again in almost the exact same stretch of trail.
The path narrowed there between dense sections of pine where the morning light always seemed dimmer than everywhere else around it. He noticed the spot before he noticed the sound, which was probably why the whistle unsettled him faster this time.
It drifted through the trees somewhere off to his left again.
Not loud.
Not distant either.
He slowed slightly while listening.
The whistling stopped immediately.
He stood there for a second catching his breath, eyes moving through the woods without focusing on anything specific. Nothing moved back there. No footsteps. No branches shifting. Just trees disappearing into fog.
After a while he started running again.
About thirty seconds later, the whistle returned.
Behind him.
Not close enough to panic him. Just close enough that he noticed the difference right away.
He looked back over his shoulder while still jogging.
The trail behind him curved gently through the trees, empty except for low fog hanging near the ground.
The whistle came again.
He laughed quietly under his breath, mostly to break the feeling beginning to settle into him. Probably another guy from the retreat out on the trail. Maybe someone who had realized they crossed paths two mornings in a row and decided to mess with him a little.
That explanation worked well enough to carry him back to camp.
Still, by the time the cabins came back into view through the trees, he realized he had spent the last several minutes listening for the whistle without meaning to.
At breakfast one of the older men asked whether anyone had used the trails yet.
He mentioned he’d been running them in the mornings.
The older man nodded while stirring cream into his coffee.
“Hear any whistling out there?”
The question landed strangely flat. Not dramatic. Not joking. Casual enough that it took a second to process.
“Yeah,” he said. “Probably another runner.”
“Maybe.”
The man took a sip of coffee and looked out the lodge windows toward the woods.
Then, after a few seconds, he added quietly:
“Just don’t whistle back.”
Nobody else at the table reacted. Someone reached for bacon. Another guy started talking about fishing near the dock. The conversation moved on normally, but the sentence stayed where it was.
Just don’t whistle back.
The third morning was colder than the others.
Fog rested low across the trail, thick enough in places that the trees faded into pale shapes before disappearing completely. The woods felt smaller because of it, more closed in.
He almost skipped the run altogether.
Not because he was scared exactly. Just unsettled enough that staying inside sounded easier.
Still, after laying awake for a while listening to the others sleep, he got up anyway.
The trail felt different that morning. Even his breathing sounded too loud once he got deep enough into the trees.
When he reached the narrow stretch between the pines, he slowed automatically without realizing he was doing it.
The whistle came immediately.
Closer this time.
Not loud.
Just near enough that he no longer had to convince himself it belonged to another section of trail somewhere farther away.
He stopped running.
The whistle stopped too.
The silence afterward felt larger than it should have. He stood there listening to his heartbeat settle while fog drifted slowly between the trunks ahead of him.
Nothing moved.
No footsteps.
No shape.
After a while, he started jogging again.
The whistle returned almost instantly.
Behind him.
Closer than before.
His pace increased slightly without fully deciding to. Not sprinting. Not panicking. Just moving faster in the same controlled way people do when they’re trying not to admit they’ve become uncomfortable.
The sound stayed behind him.
Always somewhere just beyond where he could confidently place it.
By the time he caught sight of the lake again through the trees, his chest felt tight for reasons that had nothing to do with the run.
The cabins sat ahead in the fog, pale shapes near the shoreline.
He slowed near the edge of the woods.
The whistling stopped.
He stood there listening until the woods settled again.
Nothing moved after that.
No footsteps. No branches shifting. No sound except his breathing slowly evening back out.
Eventually he turned back toward the cabins. The lake appeared in pale stretches through the trees ahead of him now, close enough that he could already make out the first dock posts near the shoreline.
He started walking again.
Then stopped almost immediately.
Because somewhere directly behind him, close enough that he felt it before he fully heard it,
someone whistled softly from the trail.
Not from the woods.
Not from somewhere deeper between the trees.
From right where he had just been standing.
He didn’t turn around right away.
Couldn’t.
Every muscle in his back tightened at once while the sound hung there behind him in the cold morning air.
Then the whistle came again.
Soft.
Absentminded.
The exact same tune he’d caught himself whistling earlier that morning without even realizing it.
Ooooh this is a good one!