The black vans randomly popped up around our hamlet. People started going missing around this time, and many of us began to piece the puzzle together and link it back to the vans. We didn’t know if it was a Cartel, some shady government operative, or if it was maybe a glitch and the town had turned a bunch of cars black again (this happened in the summer of 2009).

All that us townsfolk had to go with was this; they showed up at city hall one Thursday in late March and then began popping up around town like a creeping cancer.

My father is friends with a man named Rick, who has lived in this town for all sixty-eight years of his life, and he was genuinely freaked out by these vans showing up. He’s lived through all the strange events that have befallen this town for the past sixty-eight years, served in Vietnam, escaped a volcanic eruption by the skin of his teeth, and was supposed to be on the plane that hit the South Tower on 9/11; nothing freaks this man out.

My encounter began about a week after the first appearances.

It was raining on Friday. The rains came sporadically throughout the day; sometimes it was no more than a light mist or maybe a bit of a drizzle, sometimes it would be a heavy downpour. I was stuck in my apartment for most of the day (even though I had the day off), so I mostly just watched Netflix and such. Evidently, the fifth season of Arrested Development was split into two parts. Either way, I didn’t enjoy it all that much.

One of the vans showed up across the street from my apartment building. This had happened on Monday as well, but nothing came from it, so I wasn’t overly concerned. I had no idea why they were here. The oddities of the town had been dying down as of recently, so I had no idea as to what prompted their sudden reappearance.

Around six o’clock in the evening, I got a text from Victoria. She was hiding in her closet because someone had come out of the can parked by her house and broke in the back door. I instantly called the police, but apparently, all circuits were busy. Usually, the phone lines don’t act up like this until late November, so I was on my own. At that very moment, I heard my entry door being tampered with, and I went to hide in the crawlspace behind my bed. I must’ve been there for ten minutes before the door actually opened and two men dressed completely in black came inside.

Next Chapter: 03