Dark Angel by Lisa Jane Smith, now you can read online.
Gillian Lennox didn't mean to die that day.
She was mad, though. Mad because she had missed her ride home from school, and because she was cold, and because it was two weeks before Christmas and she was very, very lonely.
She walked by the side of the empty road, which was about as winding and hilly as every other country road in south-western Pennsylvania, and viciously kicked offending clumps of snow out of her way.
It was a rotten day. The sky was dull and the snow looked tired. And Amy Nowick, who should have been waiting after Gillian cleaned up her studio art project, had already driven away-with her new boyfriend.
Sure, it must have been an honest mistake. And she wasn't jealous of Amy, she wasn't, even though one week ago they had both been sixteen and never been kissed.
Gillian just wanted to get home.
That was when she heard the crying.
She stopped, looked around. It sounded like a baby-or maybe a cat. It seemed to be coming from the woods.
Her first thought was, Paula Belizer. But that was ridiculous. The little girl who'd disappeared somewhere at the end of this road had been gone for over a year now.
The crying came again. It was thin and far away-as if it were coming from the depths of the woods. This time it sounded more human.
"Hello? Hey, is somebody in there?"
There was no answer. Gillian stared into the dense stand of oak and hickory, trying to see between the gnarled bare trees. It looked uninviting. Scary.
Then she looked up and down the road. Nobody. Hardly surprising-not many cars passed by here.
I am not going in there alone, Gillian thought. She was exactly the opposite of the "Oh, it's such a nice day; let's go tramping through the woods" type. Not to mention exactly the opposite of the brave type.
But who else was there? And what else was there to do?