Death’s door

Last one through holds the door.

When Mrs. Jones had said it, it had made perfect sense. She hadn’t elaborated and honestly she made it seem like the logic was unquestionable. To be fair, she was in a hurry. Her kids had been sick, not so long ago, and she was in a rush to get to them. Still, it would have been nice if she had offered a little clarification.

See our town was small. Small even by local standards. It sat just north of an old oxbow bend in the river that long ago had shrunken from lake to pond. When the lake had started drying up so had the towns life blood. If no one came to Bow Lake to grind wheat, then no one was around to fish trout, or buy a slice of pie.

Within five years Bow Lake had become so empty that when a stranger did turn up they were met with suspicion, not welcome. All they seemed to do was drag themselves to our town to die. Some carried scabies and other less curable maladies. One poor soul coughed themselves to death in the back row of the school house during a harvest moon. If we had been in the classroom instead of the fields perhaps he could have been helped.

In the fall of 1867 a fever swept through what was left of the town like wild fire. It laid waste to Bow Lake. The elderly fell first. Then the children. Finally, the doctor left, fearful for his family’s life. Empty houses and darkened doorsteps proclaimed the illness as winner.

It was all we could do to keep the dead from the living, but I stayed and helped where I could. Even after mother sent Susie to Aunt Loraine’s.

Reverend Thompson blessed ground to expand the graveyard, but there wasn’t even time to complete the fence before it was in use. Dutifully I fed and held the hands of those who remained. Till it was my turn to hold on as long as I could. Just wishing for the pain to stop. For “this too shall pass” to be made real, but my wishes were as useless as any of my other efforts. If I try, I can remember hands hotter than my fever tending to me. The moaning sounds of the dying around me in the half light.

The next day, as I watched with an unexpected level of detachment, they laid me upon the burying grounds but not in them, everyone was too sick by then. After that the only people who even got close to the the cemetery were the ones who dragged themselves as close as they could before collapsing. In hopes the hallowed ground would grant them sanctuary. I always assumed.

I watched… Those poor souls did not linger long. I tried to pull them through the unfinished gate. To give them the words that Mrs. Jones gave me, but it never worked. I even tried to roam into the town during the daylight hours and tempt the dying to follow me, but it was a doomed attempt. The few who could move never saw me, and those who saw me never moved again.

I waited… The town withered away to nothing. No gravedigger came for the fallen and no one from the relay station checked on the suddenly silent telegraph line. It was as if Bow Lake had fallen off the map and not a single interested party asked why. The weeks trudged by till I lost count of the years. Still no one came to claim the ruined town for their own. Even once the evidence of the fever was ground down, by time and nature, into tainted soil no one put down roots.

I held the door… At first with all of the impatience of a person listening from the next room. I could imagine the joys on the other side of Death’s door, but I could never know if my loved ones waited for my tardy arrival. Then with resignation as I accepted my fate of conscripted sentry. Nothing from that side slid out and nothing from our side wondered in. Now with anticipatory glee.

On a whim I walked out of the cemetery one night and into the woods. It took time for a shadow to start leaking out of the door. Longer still for it to emerge fully fledged, a deeper darkness with an outline changeable like a swarm of bees that moved with the sound of sharp shears cutting fabric. But what was that to me, I had time in spades.

Now for the first time in over a century I do not know what will happen next. I can hear someone in the north woods and I can see the shadow swarm slithering in that direction. Some small part of me still worries over my decision to abandon Death’s door, but the louder hungrier part of myself cannot wait to rip it off it’s hinges.

Image is from the billion graves blog (https://legacy-blog.billiongraves.com/rescuing-abandoned-cemeteries/)

An unfulfilled promise

The heavy humid night felt like an unfulfilled promise as the wind slapped against the nape of Nate’s neck. The summer sun had been draining the color and the life from his crunchy lawn for weeks now, but he could not bring himself to water it. Even in the convection oven of July that seemed an unnecessary luxury while fires raged to the north and west.

He could not stop himself from looking up though. Watching the blanketed sky sweep by on the long gusts, that stirred up the cicadas and sent the trees into a chorus of pleas for rain, how much was smoke and how much was cloud. Nate hoped that the scales were tipping in favor of clouds. Not just because the almond trees that ran like stubble over the hilly 20 acres Quentin had purchased two years ago were looking worse by the day, but mostly.

The dryness had everyone on edge. First responders, farmers, and banks all their eyes on the cost and the loss. A bottom line that only seemed to be getting more dire.

So, Nate couldn’t help himself from sending out a wordless call for help as the wind died down and everything sagged under the weight of 98% humidity. If his desperation could have been given a voice it might have said “please do not make the hard working suffer needlessly”. Maybe it would have just asked “why”.

Either way it deserved a response.

Sleep talk

He dreamed loudly, alternating between a deep stillness and shouted gibberish. It gave the impression that he was having an energetic conversation complete with gestures and nods of his head. However, to whom he was speaking remained a mystery.

Dark day

I was in it. I felt empty, unloved, and tired. Just a hair’s breadth from the edge where I joyfully burn everything down then languish in the ashes. I needed an outlet. My books had betrayed me and my go to projects all seemed pointless. It was going to be food, drink, or ink tonight. If only I could drum up the energy to choose. I closed my eyes, daring life to take the cheap shot, while I counted to ten.

Food had arrived first in my muddled mind so I followed the rising noise towards the smell of deep fried sins. As luck would have it I was able to hit two birds with that particular stone. So I sipped at pitch black stout between slugs of sweet Jack while you placed my order. You smiled more than once, and it tore at me. I know I stared, but I didn’t have a reason to look away.

During dessert I had to blink away double vision, but it didn’t stop me from finding the pen in my bag. Letting myself fill napkin after napkin with wry and sardonic quips. Writing you was as cathartic as it was narcissistic. I couldn’t tell you what I wrote that night, so sure I would never see you again, but I would bet it was truth. Hard truths that make most people cringe.

I have no idea what you thought when I stumbled away from that bar. Would you read my words wrapped up in your tip? Did you know that your smile brightened my dark day? Even if you never read those words…

Thank you.

Your kind eyes and the sympathetic tilt of your head saved me last night.

Solstice

It felt overcrowded. The dark chill of the longest night always made Bianca claustrophobic. As she lit the large three wick candle sitting on the window sill the room shrank even more.

One for Fear.

Another for Doubt.

The last for Hope.

The brightness of the light against the cold dark pane seemed false to Bianca like all summer promises in the face of a winter storm. She tried to quiet her mind and make herself present, still Doubt tugged at her. Bianca slowly opened her eyes only to find Fear stared back. If her breath hadn’t caught Bianca would have blown the candle out, suddenly preferring the oppressive dark to the stifling light, but the warmth of Hope washed over her.

She checked her watch, settled a blanket over her shoulders ready to wait out the night, and when dawn finally trailed through the window Bianca drew an easy breath.

“And so the wheel turns again.”

Blood, tears, and gasoline

The tears tasted clean after the blood. So she resisted the urge the wipe her face or control her sobs. Maybe this was nature’s way. Maybe we cried to heal ourselves, like so much sap running to seal over the gaping wound of a lost branch. She only realized the tears had stoped when she heard her own hiccuped breath breaking the silence. Cringing internally and struggling externally she tried to quiet herself.

“Take your medicine,” he’d said before it started. Maybe he’d known. Maybe he could sense the brokenness inside, and wanted to shore up the weakness one broken bone at a time.

The chill of the concrete floor was all encompassing. Tiny shuddering trimmers ran though her like lightning strikes. She was so cold without the warmth of her tears. Till his prone shape shifted upon the couch, breaking her internal focus. Smallness hadn’t been the answer an hour ago still she felt herself trying to draw inward. All of her went silent. The trembling stoped. Her breathing slowed. Time unwound itself in lazy circles.

His footsteps filled her ears till his hot breath on the curve of her shoulder drove out any other sensation.

“Ready for more?”

The question hit her harder than his hand had, and for a second despair leaked into her soul. Maybe when he pulled her upright something snapped. Maybe he either hadn’t heard or didn’t care, but the residue of his rough hand on her arm had left fire not ice. It surged through her veins causing her to flush and made her breathing ragged.

“That seems like a yes,” he jeered.

She met his eyes for a second before reacting. “It’s a no actually!” She punctuated her words with a sharp knee thrust before running for the door. Her bare feet slapped against the asphalt shredding more with each step. She only slowed down enough to throw herself into the first open door she could find.

She could feel everyone’s eyes on her judging and predatory. Maybe she’d run from the pan to the fire. Maybe it hadn’t been steal that clicked into place when he’d pulled her up to him. She walked as quickly as she could towards the bartender pulling at her clothes wishing she was better protected. His eyes moved in an up then down appraisal before they went dull and cold, the smile gone from his unshaven face.

“I…”

The small bells over the door rang, announcing the newest patron. She didn’t have to look to know what she’d find. Not a single pair of eyes would meet hers, and those looking her way held themselves in postures of disdain not concern. She froze like a deer in headlights as he cracked jokes at her expense while the bartender, an obvious acquaintance, laughed along.

The sound followed her into the night and haunted her every step. Each block she put between herself and the known danger seemed to put her a block closer to the unknown dangers lurking just out of sight. By the time she made it to the police office her feet throbbed in time with each side stabbing breath. Her progress was watched by the unblinking eyes of surveillance cameras and measured in dirty footprints by the age-worn police officer at the front desk. He waited for her to approach his counter never once offering assistance.

“I need to report a crime.”

He scoffed, lifted a phone, and requested assistance. Ignoring her completely he started to fill out paperwork. Each second he refused to acknowledge her and every line he scratched on to the form tore at her resolve. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe tears make you invisible, the salt slowly eroding anything of value till nothing remains.

“Jerry from The Stoop called awhile back,” he said while filling out page two of the form. “How’d you think this would play out? Drinking alone. Dressed like that. People shouldn’t be surprised when they get what they ask for.”

Frustration blazed down her spine. Shame flamed in her heart. Conviction seared through her veins. This time the tears wouldn’t sooth. These tears were gasoline, and she wasn’t going to stop till she burned the whole institution down.

Image as seen on WritersCafe.org

A moment of peace

The day’s rain could still be heard in the leaves of the trees, softly rustling in the gentle breeze, and plodding off the broken drain pipe onto the slate slab walkway below. The sky, however, had been washed clean. The stars sparkled and the moon’s illumination fell softly upon the night. While the easy rise and fall of the nighttime thrum sang of rest and eternity.

It represented a moment of peace, and in that moment everything was beautiful.

What do you remember?

As seen on Wikipedia all rights to the owner

The night was sharp. I have no better way to describe it. It looked like it had been cutaway from the daylight by a painter’s knife with short sure motions. 

I could focus on little else.

Driven to distraction it wasn’t till my fingers started to burn from the icy wind that I looked away from the heavenly Bob Ross. Summer sunsets are beautiful, don’t get me wrong, but there is some kind of eery otherworldliness in crisp winter night skies. 

Once inside I turned off the TV and put a kettle on to boil, the image had me in the mood for strong tea and dark silence. So I watched the red-orange flames lick out alive waiting for the hiss of steam.

I held the mug with both hands soaking up the minty warmth, but the tension in my shoulders refussed to drain away. Something in the night nagging at the periphery of my attention. The house was quite, the door was locked, I closed my eyes willing the edges of my frayed nerves to lie flat…

I startle at the sound of a man clearing his throat sloshing piping hot tea onto my right hand.

“Ma’am can you tell me what happened,” he asks a look somewhere between pity and suspicion in his eyes.

“Happened? What happened?”

He checks a notepad while I look around the small uncomfortable room. It has dingy short pile carpet, a table with coffee cup rings, and hard molded plastic chairs. The man makes direct eye contact, only suspicion this time, “What do you remember?”

“It was sharp,” his eyebrows shoot towards the ceiling, “the night was sharp.” I elaborate, “the sky had this look like it was painted, you know what I mean? Too many straight edges…sharp-like.”

“That’s what you remember?” 

He’s incredulous.

“What about the fire? Do you not remember the fire?” The man is very nearly yelling at me.

I consider what he has said, thinking back, trying to remember. Like a reflex I take a sip of tea, “I made tea.” I offer holding up the mug.

He stands and walks to the door. Quick quiet words are exchanged with someone I cannot see. “I just handed you that tea ma’am,” he says while walking back to the table, “you don’t remember anything.” This time it’s a statement not a question.

“The night was sharp and otherworldly.”

He looks at me so hard he looks through me. The pity is back in his eyes.

A lifetime of night

As I rose in the dark a small part of me felt relief.  The dark was… familiar by now, almost comforting.  A lifetime of night had left me always drawing back from the light, in fear, rather than inching forward, but my family could never know that.

“I wish it would have worked darling, I want you to truly see me.”

I smile my crooked smile in response unable to say the truth, I do not want to see you in that way, because, “I’ve always truly seen your heart dear, and that’s more then enough for me.”

As seen on curtishallblog.com

This is a 100 word challenge for grown ups (100WCGU).  The prompt is …as I rose in the dark…

You get 100 words plus the prompt.  To submit your own take on the prompt follow this link.

The only night

Diana Spelton lives at 1331 Blackburnian Way.  She is a newspaper enthusiast who receives the Journal and the Times in addition to her local edition.  She reads the local rag first over her morning coffee which she most commonly enjoys in her east facing rocking chair.  Then after a brief, 10 to 15 minute, shower Diana savors the Times along with her obligatory toast and jam.  The Journal she saves till last.  Tucked neatly between her elbow and slender waist it makes the 192 steps to her bus stop only to be read and recycled before she switches on the desktop in her cubical.  She eats her lunch beneath a small tree which flowers in the spring and turns orange in the fall.  For dinner Diana keeps the TV company till her seemingly mandatory 10:30pm bedtime.  Then 1331 Blackburnian Way goes dark till Diana opens the green front door to slide her white terry clothed arm out for her papers.  The only variation to this routine is Halloween night.

My name is Dwight Menders.  Diana moved into the neighborhood three years ago, and since that moment I have been drawn to her.  Too shy at first to walk up and start a conversation I positioned myself so we could ‘bump’ into each other multiple times per day.  I hoped that we could start a conversation organically rather than the scripted typical interactions I had with people.  But that never happened, she never even noticed me.  No polite smile, how’s the weather, nothing.  I didn’t exist.  She couldn’t see me, but I saw her.

It’s me who places her papers neatly upon her door step.  Me who jogs ahead pressing the cross walk signals so she never has to wait.  Me who brushes her tiny bench beneath the tree free of trash, debris, and loiterers.  Me who shares her laughter at the nightly scripted comedies.  Me who keeps vigilant watch over her as she sleeps.  And it is me who beneath the Halloween mask buys her drink after drink as she sits in her sexy costume on the bar stool. 

The only night she allows herself to drink too much.  The only night she sees me.  The only night I get to do more than just watch Diana through the invisible glass that separates my world from hers.  The only night she never remembers.

*******Happy Halloween!*******

This is my attempt at a scary story, hope it had at least a little bit of a creep factor 😉  I wanted to write something that if told in the dark around a campfire might make you look over your shoulder, and nothing gives me the heebie-jeebies like a watcher you never know is there ! 

So I ask you what’s your favorite camp fire story or creeps you the heck out?