May 1, 2019
Here’s how I imagine it happened, back in 2001:
The weather outside was almost unbearable. An early heatwave loomed over the fields, and the storms that rolled through that afternoon left behind a swampy, balmy soup of thick air and hovering mosquitos. Bad as that was, the atmosphere inside the mill was worse. Thirty some bodies crammed into a dark, dusty space, all breathing and dancing and spilling drinks, jumping around to music so loud it shook your brains, yelling and singing, and just hot, frenetic chaos.
“I’m going outside,” Jo Whitney said to no one in particular, because no one could hear her, anyway. At least, that’s how I imagine it. I’ve been told I have a good imagination.
People wondered later where she’d gone, and no one told the police about the party when they came around asking questions. A bunch of kids drinking alcohol in an abandoned, condemned building on the night before graduation? Not one of them said a word, and they wouldn’t have had anything to say, either, because Jo slipped out of the mill and into the night, and that was the last any of them – or anyone at all – ever saw of her.
May 2, 2019
Joanna Whitney’s was the tenth disappearance associated with Sally’s Mill. It wouldn’t be the last, and I think we’re on number thirteen now. Or so the rumors say. And still people go there. Kids party, the curious search, police patrol, and every few years, some unlucky soul goes missing. It’s not our town’s oldest tradition – that would be the Winter Hunt – but it is the most talked about. Well, that would probably also be the Winter Hunt, but Sally’s Mill is a pretty close second. There’s even a rhyme we say, when we’re young and more amused than afraid: “Stay away from the hill, and from old Sally’s Mill.”
It’s not much, I know.
May 5, 2019
As it turns out, my dad got caught up in it once, all the Sally’s Mill craziness, when he was about seventeen. He told me this story today, and I’m recording it here, in my second journal of the year, because I feel like someone should write this down, and because he never reads my journals and so he won’t know I told on him.
Here’s what he said:
It was a stormy night, heavy and damp and dark. Thunder rumbled through the trees, and on the horizon, lightning flashed bright and white against the black sky. My dad was at a party, and went outside to get cigarettes from his car. As he stood outside the door of the mill, smoking (gross, Dad!), he heard hounds and the call of hunting horns, howls and yelps, and people shouting, and the braying and steady gallop of horses. He heard them over the music from the party, and the rush of the wind. He said it sounded like they were only down the hill, so close by, but he didn’t see anyone. And as the sound moved closer and closer to him, he said it was like the air froze, and all he could think was, “What in the hell?” And then he ran inside, and he never told anyone. Not because he was scared. He never told anyone because he dropped his cigarette when he ran, and it started a small fire in the brush, and everyone had to run away and the police investigated and declared it an arson. The good news is, no one got hurt, and the fire didn’t do too much damage. The bad news is, my dad’s guilty of arson, I guess.
They say nothing good ever happens at Sally’s Mill. I guess they’re right, huh?
May 11, 2019
It shouldn’t be ninety degrees in early May, but here we are. Today is Saturday, but you couldn’t pay me to go outside in this. Today will be a reading day for me.
I feel bad for writing down what my dad told me. I think it’s sort of a silly story, but I wouldn’t want him to get in trouble for something that happened so long ago, especially when it was an accident and it didn’t hurt anybody. I’m thinking about tearing out that page.
May 12, 2019
I did some reading yesterday on fox hunting. I’m surprised it’s not obsolete. But I did learn that it never happens at night, so I don’t know what my dad heard. He was probably drunk. It was dark, and the weather was awful. He was just a kid who made a mistake, and I wonder if he made up the whole story just to justify what he did. It’s a horrible thing to think, isn’t it?
May 18, 2019
I just can’t help but wonder why people keep going to the mill. I guess people just can’t get enough of scary stories, but still: I wonder, I wonder, I wonder. My grandmother always told me she was proud of how curious I am. I’m starting to think it’s actually a curse. There are always more questions than answers, and every time you get an answer, it just leads to more questions. It’s enough to drive someone crazy. Not me, but someone.
May 20, 2019
Okay, so I’ve done some research. It’s interesting, actually. There’s nothing in the history of Sally’s Mill that makes it a haunted or a frightening or an unsafe place, other than the fact that it’s condemned, of course. It was built around 1810 by the Marsden family. They’re still around. Named for John Marsden’s wife, who lived long and happy, and tended by that same family or their relatives until it closed down for good in 1981. John and Sally had several children, kept a couple of houses in the state, and were involved in all sorts of local issues and events. The only thing I found that made me nervous is that there was a Civil War battle in the area, and some of the soldiers did hide in the mill at one point. They got caught, of course, and carted away as prisoners.
And then, I guess, there are the disappearances, but maybe that’s just coincidence? I should do some research on those, too, but I’ve got end of school exams and essays and such coming up, so I don’t know when I’ll have time.
May 25, 2019
There’s a party at Sally’s Mill tonight. Should I go? I’m not actually invited, but one of my friends is, and I’m sure I could tag along unnoticed.
May 25, 2019 (later)
I’m going. Even though it’s hotter than Hades right now and I’m not really invited, I’m going. But I’m going in smart. I’m bringing supplies: a flashlight, a whistle, a camera, a recorder, and just because I know it will be loud and miserably sweaty, some earplugs and my portable neck fan. I know I’ll look like a dork. I don’t care. People don’t really notice me, anyway.
I’m nervous, though, still. Maybe because I’m not a social creature, or maybe because of the disappearances, or my dad’s story. I’ll update tomorrow. If I come home, that is! (Oh, God, why did I even write that?)
May 26, 2019
What an absolute waste of time! A big, fat, annoying nothing. I stood inside, I stood outside. I waited. I saw nothing. There was nothing. Just the mill, and the hot weather, and a bunch of kids drinking warm beer. My head hurts. I dripped enough sweat last night to fill five buckets, and I came home with a bruise of my knee from falling down a set of rickety old stairs. And I ripped my favorite jeans.
Never again, Sally’s Mill. You and I – we’re not friends.
May 26, 2019 (later)
I spoke too soon. I feel awful. I can’t believe it.
Jackson Fletcher disappeared last night.
He never came home after the party. I did see him there, in a corner with his buddies, but I don’t remember if he left before me or not. I did see him go outside. Did I see him come back in? I’m not sure. I don’t know. I DON’T KNOW. Maybe he’s just at a friend’s house. Maybe he crashed his car and he’s in a ditch somewhere. That’s not better, is it?
WHY DOES ANYONE GO TO SALLY’S MILL?
And why him? Why him, of everyone there? Why not anyone else? Why not me?
May 30, 2019
I’ve considered ripping out all of these pages and burning them. I don’t know where I’d burn them, but I just don’t know if I ever want anyone to read them. I’m only a few pages into this journal, anyway, and I could scrap the whole thing.
Jackson Fletcher is still missing. I don’t think he’ll ever come home. I see it in my head. His mother saying goodbye to her son for the last time on Saturday evening, his face at the party, laughing and bobbing his head to the beat of the music, and not one of them knew. Not one of them knew it would be the last time, that he wouldn’t come home. It’s just horrible.
I looked back today on my entries about Jo Whitney, and I just…I can’t believe I wrote about it like that, like her life was a story. I can’t believe it happened again. I guess it just never seemed real.
I don’t know what I’ll do with this. I don’t know who I can tell – about this journal, my dad’s story, Jackson, the mill. Any of it. But if I don’t trash it, and you find it, and you read this one day, I’ll tell you, because now I know it’s true, what they say. I hope you stay away. I hope they tear the whole building down. I hope it burns. I hope it collapses. I hope it rots away and becomes just a distant, terrible memory. I hope you believe me.
Nothing good ever happens at Sally’s Mill.
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Thank you for reading! This is the fifth of twelve stories I’ll write as part of my 2022 Short Story Challenge. Twelve months, twelve stories, and the theme this year is: Folklore
Here are the first four, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me in the challenge! I think it’s going to be a very good year for stories. But just reading is good, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
The next story will be posted at the end of June.
A Virginia Writer's Diary 