When I was younger, my mother was very adamant in telling me not to whistle during the night, especially in the forest behind our house. It is some sort of family legend that went back to my third great-grandparents and is still being told to the younger family members to this day, though, sometimes whoever is telling the story changes one thing or two.

The most recent activity regarding the legend happened when my mother was roughly six years old, it was getting dark when my grandfather and she had gone to the forest behind the family house to stargaze because they were both obsessed with everything related to outer space, unlike my uncles and aunts that had no interest in it. My mother had picked up a habit of whistling ever since she was taught how to by her oldest brother, and when grandfather was setting up everything for their stargazing session my mother started whistling. It's important to point out that they hadn't told her about the legend yet because my grandmother felt as if doing so would scare and traumatize her, considering that she was very young then, so she was oblivious to this crucial rule.

As soon as grandfather heard her, he instructed her to stop doing it, but she was a stubborn child and continued whistling; all of a sudden they heard a scream for help coming from the forest, here's the catch though: my grandparents owned land that was passed through generations, one could either access the forest by entering and crossing the property until they reached the gate facing it or from the other side of the forest where there was some sort of camping park, several miles away from the house.

According to my grandfather, there was something off with the plea for help, it followed a certain pattern where the person – or whatever that was – would scream four times for help and then would go silent for fifteen seconds as if they were trying to pretend to be human to lure them in. There was silence for a minute before the screams appeared to come from close by and got a little more violent, that was the cue for my grandfather to leave, so he quickly organized what they had brought and picked up my mother to return home. She says she doesn't remember much of what happened that day aside from seeing what seemed to be the shadow figure waving to her when they were returning from the forest, which caused her to have nightmares for a long time.

Growing up hearing these same stories over and over again conditioned me to stop believing in them and realize that maybe they were made up and told to the younger family members in order to push away the idea of going to the forest, scary ghost stories do seem like an effective way to discourage children from entering there and – potentially – get lost and/or hurt.

My favorite cousin (and best friend) shared the same belief as me, or rather, disbelief, she was as curious as me to debunk this myth once and for all, so we planned on entering the forest during a family dinner when the grown-ups would be too focused either on my mom's tiny yet delicious sandwiches or the little kids.

When the family dinner day came, we were able to go to the gate facing the forest unnoticed because everyone was distracted by something else. Because no one was allowed in there, especially at night, the gate was always locked but I knew where they kept the keys, so my cousin and I easily managed to enter the forbidden land; we were equipped with two flashlights to guide ourselves through the dark peaceful night.

"Do you think we'll find anything?" Claire, my cousin, asked while we were walking, the gate distancing itself from us.

"I don't think so." I answered and shrugged my shoulders. "C'mon, don't tell me you're starting to believe in those stories?"

She didn't answer me and kept on walking. I thought she was maybe creeped out by the ambience surrounding us, which was valid, we didn't really know what we would encounter there and the worst-case scenario was summoning some dark entity just because we wanted to prove to everyone that they believed in some scary nonsense for many years.

"I think we're far enough." I said and looked back just to be faced with darkness. "We can't really see the gate from here."

"How do we do this? Should we just whistle?" Claire asked and I shrugged. "I think it should be just one of us though, it may work better that way."

"I'll do it." I replied while turning on the voice recorder, that was just a precaution in case we did discover anything and wanted to further analyse it.

After making sure everything was set up I sighed and then whistled.

We waited in silence for about a minute. Nothing.

"Try doing it again." Claire instructed and I nodded.

I whistled again, louder this time.

We waited again. Nothing.

"As we expected there is nothing he–" I started saying but a sound cut me off.

"What?"

"Shhhhh." I whispered and signed Claire to shut up.

I heard it again, it was the sound of leaves rustling. Then another sound came up as if someone had stepped on a branch.

"Did you hear that?" I looked at my cousin. "The leaves rustling? The branch breaking?"

"It may just be the wind, don't overthink it. C'mon, don't tell me you're starting to believe in those stories?" She had a playful grin on her lips, I rolled my eyes.

"Just being careful. Want to keep walking?" She nodded.

We walked not more than four meters from where we were before I started hearing the rustling and branch sounds again, followed by what seemed to be a whisper.

"Marie."

"What?" I asked my cousin, turning my face to look at her.

"Huh?" She answered confused.

"Didn't you call me?"

"Nope."

We kept on walking a little more before I heard it again, but it still sounded like a faint whisper. I decided to ignore it because I thought my cousin was pulling a very unfunny prank on me. It didn't stop.

"Marie."

"Are you trying to fuck with my head?" At this point, I was visibly annoyed by my cousin's antics, which I thought were childish.

"What are you on about? I didn't do anything!" She said slightly raising her voice.

"Marie! Help me." The calling sounded more demanding this time.

This wasn't coming out of Claire's mouth, I was facing directly at her and she hadn't moved an inch. My whole body got chills as I recognized that voice, I knew it better than anyone despite not having heard it in a very long time.

"Marie, please help me, I'm scared."

The voice came out smoothly this time, my heart started beating faster and I couldn't manage to move. Was it really him? It had been so long since I last saw him, since I last heard his voice. What was he doing here on this dark cold night? I needed to find him, wherever he was, wherever that voice was coming from. I needed to see him and make sure he was alright.

My Saint, I missed him so much that I couldn't even decide whether I would scream at him for basically abandoning me or if I would hug him so tight that he would have difficulty breathing.

I started walking faster while pointing my flashlight everywhere: the ground, the trees, anywhere, looking for my brother.

"What are you doing?" My cousin asked trying to keep up with my pace. "Hey, I'm talking to you!"

"My brother is here, he's calling for me." I replied shortly, focusing on finding him.

"Stop playing, let's just go back to the house, this was a waste of time. We were excited for nothing."

"Help me, Marie."

"You go, I'm going to find him." I replied.

"Marie, come on, let's go back."

I ignored her, accelerating my steps, almost tripping on my own feet because of a mixture of dry leaves and broken branches.

"Saint! Saint!" I screamed, getting desperate at the fact that I couldn't find him anywhere yet his voice was coming from near me.

"Cut it out! What the fuck are you doing?"

"He's here Claire, he's calling for me, he's calling for help!" I started walking even faster, a drop of sweat sliding through my forehead.

"Your brother is dead, Marie! Please stop this, you're scaring me." She grabbed my hand forcing me to stop walking.

"Don't say that, he's not dead, he just didn't return home." I said running out of breath from the bit of exercise I did. "He said he would be back and now he's here!"

"You are the one who found his body, M."

I did, didn't I? My mind started flooding with memories from seven years ago. I was about to turn thirteen years old and my brother was eighteen years old; I remember one day my brother went out and told me he'd be back in a few minutes but didn't return home, my parents got worried and filled for a missing person report a day after his disappearance. His face was everywhere: my family made hundreds of missing person posters and put them up in every corner of the city, his smiling photo would appear in every commercial break on the tv, they even made a phone number, 1-800-04-SAINT, just for people to call if they knew any information on his whereabouts or if they had found him.

But I ended up being the one who found him ten days after his disappearance. I noticed that the gate facing the forest was slightly open and missing the big locker so I decided to investigate, that's when I found his body laying on the dirty leafy ground, his eyes shut. His skin color had changed but he still managed to look so peaceful. Later that day his body got removed from the forest. They said he committed suicide.

I couldn't believe he was just gone. No goodbye letter, no nothing. I resented him for the longest time in my life because he had left me alone, he abandoned me and couldn't even bother to at least say something to me, he didn't discuss whatever he was going through. He was my best friend and I thought I was his.

Tears started rolling down my eyes as the aftermath of my mind forcing me to remember things I had pushed back in my memory for many years. That's when I heard him again, but this time his voice was closer.

"Marie."

I could see him. He was standing by the tree my flashlight was pointing at and he was staring at me; he looked the same as the day he disappeared, I couldn't believe my eyes.

"Please tell me I'm not crazy and that you're seeing him too." I said to my cousin, who was still holding my hand, without taking my eyes off Saint.

"I think we're seeing two different things and whatever you're seeing is not your brother." Claire tightened her grip on me. "Let's get out of here now."

"Marie, come with me." Saint said with the usual calmness in his voice "I missed you."

"It is coming towards us, let's go. Now."

I couldn't even think of an answer before she started running while still grabbing my hand, naturally, I started running too, we didn't realize how far we were until we passed through the gate and locked it. Claire put her hands on her knees as she started breathing heavily due to our running, I sighed loudly.

"I guess it's safe to say that the stories were true?" Claire said laughing, I just nodded.

We managed to get inside without anyone suspecting where we were and what we were up to, I locked myself in my room for the rest of the night and I'm assuming my cousin did the same, as we agreed to not talk about whatever happened back there and forget about that night's events.

But I couldn't do that.

I couldn't wrap my head around what happened there, I listened to that audio of us in the forest over and over again but didn't catch any unusual sounds, all I could hear was our conversation and the whistling sounds of the wind for the whole twenty minutes of recording. It got me wondering whether or not I was crazy and just imagining things because of the environment I was in; even though I would never admit it out loud, maybe I was scared of being there and my brain made up the whole ordeal. The same goes for Claire, she did see something that definitely wasn't my brother. I guess we were both hallucinating.

That night I couldn't sleep because of the thoughts that were flooding my brain, on top of obsessively listening to that audio. When the time neared three o'clock I decided to go to the forest one more time to settle my brain so that I could function normally after that. I had only brought my phone with me and once again set the voice recorder on when I stepped into the forest, turning on the flashlight as well. I walked until I reached what I assumed to be the place where I had seen my brother hours before. And I whistled, rubbing my palm on my pants to dry them because they were sweating.

"Saint?" I asked cautiously, pointing my phone's flashlight around.

For a while, I didn't hear anything besides the wind and leaves rustling but I managed to notice the change in temperature there, it started getting colder in the forest despite being a hot night, or maybe my mind was playing tricks on me. At that point, nothing made sense to me and all I wanted was to put my mind at ease and sleep.

"Marie."

His voice sounded in my ears again and seemed to come from nearby. I turned my gaze to my left side because that was where I heard it from, but there was nothing.

"Marie."

I turned to my front again seeing it near the tree, just like I did earlier, only this time he didn't look like my brother. I was looking at a tall dark humanoid figure staring straight into my eyes, its mouth turning into a creepy smile; fear filled my whole body when I saw it move towards me, its movements were light as if its foot was not touching the ground. Claire was right, that wasn't my brother and I was possibly in danger. Without thinking much I started running towards my house, but I must've tripped on something because the last thing I remember from that night was that I fell and hit my head.

I woke up in a hospital bed with my cousin seated on a chair near me. She explained that just like me she couldn't sleep and received a message from me, which I don't remember sending, saying that I went back to the forest and she found me laying unconscious on the ground with a bleeding forehead. Claire somehow managed to get me back to the house but then I started having seizures, which made her call for my parents and they ended up calling 911 because it was the first time something like that had happened and no one knew what to do. At the hospital, I had three more seizures and my heart went into cardiac arrest causing the doctors to put me into an induced coma for about two days.

I have no idea what happened to me after I fell there, I don't know whether the creature got to me or not but I haven't been the same since that day. Sometimes I wake up in the forest in the middle of the night, sometimes I have night terrors about the creature, either way, I can't seem to escape it.

Any sort of advice on how to go back to normal would be very much appreciated.