Shimmer

Aubrey Thornton walked ahead of her girlfriends, who had stopped along the trail to take a selfie. She had forgotten her cellphone in the car, so she didn’t participate in the ritual.

Ahead, she saw the shimmering rays of the day’s sun and heat vibrating from the asphalt of the newly opened footpath encompassing Lake Tahoe. She thought nothing of it, not even when she felt a mild jolt of static electricity course through her entire body.

The shock, though slight, left her disoriented and dizzy. She had a sudden metallic taste in her mouth and the bright sunlight somehow seemed even brighter, at least for a few seconds.

She leaned against a nearby granite boulder, thinking she may be over-exerting herself in the higher altitude. Aubrey could hear her friends laughing and cutting up as they made the curve in the trail and came into site.

“You okay,” Lisa asked, “You look a little pale.”

“I’m fine, jus’ pushed myself a little too hard,” Aubrey said.

“Maybe we ought to go get something to eat,” Andrea suggested.

“Good idea,” Lisa said.

As they walked back to their car, Aubrey battled to shake off the feeling that something wasn’t quite right, that she felt somehow different or perhaps her friends were different. By the time lunch was finished, the odd sensation had disappeared from her adjusting mind.

“She was right here,” Lisa cried to the sheriff deputy, “And then she was gone.”

An investigator was speaking with Andrea, who was also upset, separately. He, too, was trying to piece together the two women’s odd story.

“She walked up around that boulder there,” Andrea pointed, “Lisa and me had stopped to take a couple of pictures, and by the time we walked to where we are now, Aubrey vanished.

Five days later, the massive search was called off as a sudden and late season snowstorm moved in over the lake, dropping three to 4 inches of snow. Aubrey Thornton remains a missing person to this day.

As she lay in bed that night, following her long day at Tahoe, Aubrey began to reflect. Recalling and drifting in-and-out of sleep, she realized that her friend, Andrea’s blouse had changed; the cats had become dogs.

This realization made her sit up as she felt a cold sweat cover her body.

As she did, her surroundings evaporated and she found herself prone, on a metal table, unable to move. She could sense more than see the several small gray-greenish beings crowded around her.

Aubrey Thornton screamed; but no sound came.