Summer Voice

When I was in high school, my dad spoke to the priests that ran the school and mentioned that his son was looking for work during the summer break.  I wasn't.  Something to pass the heated months of boredom he said, and something to give me some experience.  They told him I could help out the maintenance crew (a bunch of rough kids whose parents saw summer work as a form of punishment).  We'd be doing things like cleaning the rooms, buff-waxing the hallway tiles of the three-floored school, and sanding and staining every single wooden seat in the auditorium.  My first job was painting the heavy iron doors in the school's boiler room.  It was a good assignment, as it was pretty solitary, and it kept me away from those older kids.  I think the priests knew I was a little different than those guys.  And I think they knew I was grateful for that distinction.

Turns out I really liked the job.  And I liked the structure.  I got up early, ate breakfast, packed my lunch, and headed off to work.  It was only a mile from our house, so I would walk to the high school every day.  A large old cemetery lay between the house and the school, so that became my shortcut.  

Cemeteries are strange places.  They never made a lot of sense to me.  My father used to say that a person should remember deceased loved ones in the comfort of their own homes and not where they're planted in the ground.  We rarely agreed, but I agreed with him on this one. 

Now walking through a cemetery twice every day for two whole months makes a person slightly desensitized to the notion of hundreds of bodies buried all around you.  And numb to the grieving.  I saw a lot of sad people that summer. There was one guy in his thirties, I think, sitting on the grave of what I assumed was his wife, or maybe a sibling.  He was crying quite hard as his two small children played and laughed nearby. 

I saw a woman on her knees and elbows just staring at the grass of the cemetery plot as if willing her loved one to return from the dead.  When she saw me coming, she acted as though she were just clearing leaves from the grass and said 'hello' as I passed.  I saw people placing flowers, flags, sea shells, coins, and candles.  On the last week of the job and the last week of summer break, I saw the old man.

Surprisingly, I never saw any elderly people.  He was the only one.  The grave he was visiting was alone in a very private and secluded section of the cemetery.  It was hidden between thick mature shrubs and an old stone wall.  The gravel path curved nearby, and only for a brief moment could I see him through a break in the wall, where a very narrow set of slate steps led down to this singular plot.  His back was to me, so he never saw me pass.  And this portion of the path was more grass than gravel, so he never heard me either.  

The old man was speaking.  And laughing.  And that made me pause for a moment.  I crouched down behind the wall and watched him.  He was gesturing with his hands as he spoke.  Not in a crazy way, but in a very relaxed and comfortable manner.  I smiled and shook my head, and I started to get up to leave when I heard the other voice.  The voice of a woman.  

He was definitely speaking to someone.  He would tell a story and she would laugh.  He would ask a question and she would answer.  For the life of me I could not see where this other person was located. The area where he was standing wasn't that large, and the tombstone was very low with very little room behind it for anyone to sit or hide.  But this is the weird part - the voice seemed to be coming from the air around the old man.  It was very clear and didn't seem to be affected by the sound of the wind through the trees, or by the birds chirping, or by the loud calls of cicadas.  It was extremely clear, and I could hear it more distinctly than the old man's voice, now that I think about it.  I liked the voice.  I found it to be very kind and gentle.  So I listened.  I listened for a long time that morning.  I learned that they were once married and had a very long life together.  They talked about holidays and vacations and how they first met.  They spoke of their children.  The stories they discussed went back over sixty years.  

I can't really say why I wasn't afraid when I processed exactly what was happening.  The simple answer is that it was because of that voice.  It was completely and totally soothing.  And it was extremely difficult pulling myself away.  I was very late for work that first morning.

In the days that followed, I made sure I got up extra early.  It became a daily ritual of rushing to the cemetery and crouching down behind that wall.  And listening.  Listening to two people who were, and continued to be, in love.  My parents were never ones to express their emotions or maybe they just didn't show them in front of their kids.  But listening to these two people reminded me of something I heard a really long time ago when I was very young.  It was an early Sunday morning, I was in bed, and I had just opened my eyes.  I smelled coffee in the house and the sun was up.  And I heard my parents down in the kitchen.  I couldn't make out the words, but I could tell they were having the best time.  I heard my dad's voice followed by laughter from my mom.  I would hear my mom's voice flare up and then both of them laughing after.  Sounds odd to say that hearing your parents laughing was a rare thing, and I felt like I was in on the world's greatest secret that morning.  I was never so content being a part of that moment.  And that's how it felt to me now, crouching in an old cemetery.  I was part of a special secret.  Of someone else's intense happiness.  And the world allowed this strange incredible event to occur.  And it allowed the old man, and now me, to be a part of it.  

I listened that day until it was time to head off to work.  I slowly rose from my spot behind the wall.  Making sure to stay low as I usually did, and still listening to their conversation.  But on this morning, I lost my balance for a second and leaned too hard against the old stones of the wall.  I felt it shift slightly and heard one of the larger rocks on the other side of the wall come loose.  It fell onto the slate steps leading down to the old man.  The voice stopped mid-sentence.  And so did everything else.  The wind, the birds, the cicadas.  The only thing that I did hear was the voice of the old man, calling to his wife.  It started out quietly, and then rose to a panicked frantic pitch.  He called her name so many times.  He pleaded her name.  Then he just started wailing.  And I ran.  I ran so hard.   

On the first day of school, I cut through the cemetery again, and walked by the old stone wall, and the steps.  I knew the old man wouldn't be there.  So I didn't even look.

Click the photo when you're done reading the story.

One Of The Forbidden Doors Stood Open...

He was above the somber tree barrier. For the first time he stood high over the windy chestnuts and elms and as far as he could see was green grass, green trees, and white ribbons on which beetles ran, and the other half of the world was blue and endless, with the sun lost and dropping away in an incredible deep blue room so vast he felt himself fall with it, screamed, and clutched the tower ledge, and beyond the trees, beyond the white ribbons where the beetles ran he saw things like fingers sticking up, but he saw no Dali-Picasso terrors, he saw only some small red-and-white-and-blue handkerchiefs fluttering high on great white poles.

He was suddenly sick; he was sick again.

Turning, he almost fell flat down the stairs.

He slammed the forbidden door, fell against it.

Ray Bradbury, Jack in the Box

Story here.

The Weeds

We called her old house The Weeds.  To this day I have never seen a home so entirely overgrown with what I think was every variety of weed and creeping vine that has ever existed.  Dandelions, crabgrass, sumac, ragweed, and thistle all grew to sizes unseen by most people.  There was an old rock garden which now appeared to be an ancient weathered graveyard, the stones coated in layers of colorful moss and fungus.  And the mushrooms.  In every dark spot under the old wild shrubs and tired branches of dying trees you could see them.  Hundreds and hundreds of bleach-white mushrooms.

During the day, the house existed in perpetual dusk due to the constant shade from the parapet of trees surrounding the property.  Crickets' calls were long and low, like the croaking of frogs.  We imagined a large swamp somewhere around the back of the place, though none of us ever dared to confirm this fact.  Well, until the day Sonny disappeared.

To be continued...

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Onion Grass

I wanted to tell this story before I forgot.

A while back, I learned that the old farmer who found it would eat breakfast at the same diner each and every Wednesday morning. I made sure I was there that day, and waited until he stood to leave before I kindly pulled him aside and asked him if the story were true, and if he’d show it to me. I had been warned about his tired indifference to this request, since most of the people in this side of the state had asked him the same two questions. After I introduced myself, he seemed a little confused, or hard of hearing, and asked me to repeat my name. After I did so, he told me I should follow him to his farm.

It was late October, so the drive to his rural home was a welcome change from my daily life of routine. I was feeling proud of myself for taking this chance and actually following through with a personal goal, even though it might have been perceived as a peculiar one. I watched his old truck ahead of me, slightly swerving on the bumpy dirt road, kicking up clouds of dust that quickly floated off across brown acres of brittle bent corn. According to some folks in the diner, it had been a very dry season and I wondered about this old farmer in front of me, and if his life had been affected by the drought. Admittedly, I know nothing of farming, and my life of gray walls and cubicles started to feel something of an embarrassment to me. A feeling which started with our handshake back at the diner. This old man's hands were massive things. His life of hard work created them, and my hand felt dwarfed and weak being gripped by his.

We turned onto a gravel road lined by enormous sycamore trees. Their patchy flaking bark reminded me of the pieces of a puzzle. They seemed to get taller, wider, and whiter as we got closer to his farm. I watched him drive through an open gate past the last two trees. He parked under a rusty metal carport attached to the side of his barn. Both structures looked like they were pushing into each other, and his garage was winning. The barn looked tired. And unsafe. It was bursting with old farm equipment, tires, hoses, rows of rusted paint cans, and the frames of two old tractors.

And I hoped that he wasn't keeping it inside.

TO BE CONTINUED...

The Moonlit Road

One night, a few months after the dreadful event, my father and I walked home from the city. The full moon was about three hours above the eastern horizon; the entire countryside had the solemn stillness of a summer night; our footfalls and the ceaseless song of the katydids were the only sound, aloof. Black shadows of bordering trees lay athwart the road, which, in the short reaches between, gleamed a ghostly white. As we approached the gate to our dwelling, whose front was in shadow, and in which no light shone, my father suddenly stopped and clutched my arm, saying, hardly above his breath:

'God! God! what is that?'

Ambrose Bierce


Image by Annadriel.

Text source.

Charles Ashmore's Trail

On the evening of the 9th of November in 1878, at about nine o'clock, young Charles Ashmore left the family circle about the hearth, took a tin bucket and started toward the spring. As he did not return, the family became uneasy, and going to the door by which he had left the house, his father called without receiving an answer. He then lighted a lantern and with the eldest daughter, Martha, who insisted on accompanying him, went in search. A light snow had fallen, obliterating the path, but making the young man's trail conspicuous; each footprint was plainly defined. After going a little more than half-way--perhaps seventy-five yards--the father, who was in advance, halted, and elevating his lantern stood peering intently into the darkness ahead.

"What is the matter, father?" the girl asked.

This was the matter: the trail of the young man had abruptly ended, and all beyond was smooth, unbroken snow. The last footprints were as conspicuous as any in the line; the very nail-marks were distinctly visible. Mr. Ashmore looked upward, shading his eyes with his hat held between them and the lantern. The stars were shining; there was not a cloud in the sky; he was denied the explanation which had suggested itself, doubtful as it would have been--a new snowfall with a limit so plainly defined. Taking a wide circuit round the ultimate tracks, so as to leave them undisturbed for further examination, the man proceeded to the spring, the girl following, weak and terrified. Neither had spoken a word of what both had observed. The spring was covered with ice, hours old.

Returning to the house they noted the appearance of the snow on both sides of the trail its entire length. No tracks led away from it.

The morning light showed nothing more. Smooth, spotless, unbroken, the shallow snow lay everywhere.

Four days later the grief-stricken mother herself went to the spring for water. She came back and related that in passing the spot where the footprints had ended she had heard the voice of her son and had been eagerly calling to him, wandering about the place, as she had fancied the voice to be now in one direction, now in another, until she was exhausted with fatigue and emotion.

Ambrose Bierce

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The Realm Of The Unreal

There was at Auburn an old, abandoned cemetery. It was nearly in the heart of the town, yet by night it was as gruesome a place as the most dismal of human moods could crave. The railings about the plots were prostrate, decayed, or altogether gone. Many of the graves were sunken, from others grew sturdy pines, whose roots had committed unspeakable sin. 
 
Ambrose Bierce


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Miss Marble

Halloween was the time she figured most prominently in our thoughts. First because she was a witch, of course, and second because of a time-honored ritual among the neighborhood children concerning her and ourselves and that evening of the year.

From Yesterday's Witch, by Gahan Wilson.


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I really truly intensely recommend this short story.

The Ghost Maker: A Halloween Tale

"I live my days in silence, behind the barred in windows of this asylum, in a cell of shadows. Until this moment I have spoken to no living person of the events of that Halloween night five years ago - because I could neither ask for nor expect belief."

Click the image to read John Carpenter's short story which appeared in the New York Times on October 31, 1988.

Image by Burning Smile.

Thanks, Randy. I never knew this existed.