*A quick note: Yes, this is Part 1. I anticipate posting this story in three parts, and it will have to do for the rest of the year’s short story challenge. It’s going to be a good one, at least. 😊 I’ll write more about why I’ve decided to post it this way next week, but for now, enjoy! And thank you for reading!*
Tragedy runs in my family. Or, I should say, my family runs Tragedy. We used to, anyway. Falls from grace, catastrophic accidents, self-fulfilling prophecies of doom and ruin – those run in my family, too. But I don’t think any of us anticipated this particular calamity.
I suppose, that’s the thing about murder.
It happened like this. The sun rose silent and peaceful over Tragedy, and, though no one knew it yet, over the corpse of the late Cassius Fugate, just recently deceased. In the warm orange light of a new day, with the dawn casting a rosy shadow on his sunken cheeks, it might have been easy to believe that he was sleeping, peaceful and still, his head propped delicately on a mossy gray stone just inside the village green. But from this sleep, Cassius would never wake.
Or perhaps it happened like this. Cassius Fugate spent the last days of his life investigating the inner working of the Holder family, who’d long controlled the goings-on and the unpredictable financial fortunes of Tragedy, and who, in the last several months, had lost their beloved matriarch, Lorelai Robinette Holder. Exactly what Cassius thought he’d find, no one was quite sure. But Small Town America surely does love a villainous family, and Cassius had just taken over Tragedy’s local newspaper from his grandfather, a man who’d long since washed his hands of any real reporting and seemed to enjoy the more social aspects of journalism. Unlike the dogged and dauntless Cassius, Lucius was a man of fine tastes and pretty words.
The village’s adjustment to this abrupt and uncivil change of style was not exactly pleasant, and Cassius dealt with lots of accusations of “stirring the pot” and of “raking up mud” in the last days of his life. Just like me, he’d grown up in Tragedy, but the town seemed pretty ready to disown him, by the end. People can be vicious.
On his last day, Cassius caught up to me walking home from the coffee shop.
“The littlest Holder,” he called me.
“Hi, Cassius,” I answered. “You know we’re the same age. We graduated together.”
“I’m aware,” he said. “What’s got you out and about today?”
“Same thing as you,” I said. “Work, life, the inevitable need for caffeine and sustenance.”
“Ah,” he said, as if I’d given him an opening. “So it’s not the reading of your grandmother’s will?”
“That was yesterday.”
“And how did it go?”
“Well, Cassius,” I deadpanned, “about as you’d expect. Tears, dirges, a few outbursts from Uncle Sean. We’re broke, you know. I know you know.”
“Are you? I didn’t know,” he said.
Neither of us believed him.
“What are you after, Cassius?”
“Just a fine conversation with a pretty lady,” he said.
“Sure,” I answered. “Then you should probably move on.” Already, his face started to turn a delightful shade of bright pink. “What was it you used to call me? Ah, yes, I remember: ‘Moon-face Millie.’ And a few others, I think?”
Cassius was silent.
“I don’t know what you’re trying to do here, Cassius. I got nothing for you.”
He sputtered out an apology and then added, “That was a long time ago, Millie. I’ve grown as a person since then.”
“Lucky for you,” I said, “so have I.”
And I left him there, on the corner of Schoolhouse Lane and River Road. It was the last I’d ever see of him alive, and the last public interaction he appears to have had.
We came to the woods to find them. We came to search. We think we’re hunting them. We were wrong.
************
September 15, 2022 (noon)
This is day one. I’m excited, and I think the others are, too. As excursions go, this one is fairly long for me, and I think I’ve packed enough. Clothes, food, water – I’m only worried about coffee. But that’s, as they say, a me problem. Dan would say I’m addicted. I say he wouldn’t like me without coffee. I guess we’ll see which of us is more correct.
I suppose I can take some time and space here to talk about what we’re doing, and why I’m excited, and how I got here in the first place. One day, when I’m eighty, if I can keep up with this journal, I might like to read it and enjoy the memories. So it started like this:
I’m eight, or maybe nine, and my dad has gone camping with two if his good friends. Just camping. But they get more than they bargain for, and on the last night of their trip, they score the coolest recording I’ve ever heard. Hoots and calls and howls and growls, and they swear, up and down, that they managed to get proof of Bigfoot. I’m hooked. I’ve always believed in ghosts and magic. I like the idea that there are things in this world that we haven’t figured out yet. Awfully boring otherwise, right? And that tape becomes an obsession. I listen to it over and over. I start categorizing the sounds. I start researching on my own. And now, all these years later, I finally get to go out and try my luck. It’s taken me a while to feel comfortable telling people about this, because I’m not crazy or stupid. But man, if I could get a recording, or even better, a picture. I know chances are slim. But I have to try anyway.
So, into the woods I go.
There are five of us in the group. Me and Dan, who’s only coming along because he says I can’t be trusted to not freeze to death. Laura, for her camera. Ryan – he’s searching, too, and he’s good with maps. And Scott. Because he didn’t have anything better to do. We’re loading up the car now, and I’m stealing a minute to write this. I should go help. And then we’re off!
Will write more when I can.
September 16, 2022 (8:30 a.m.)
Night one was…less than successful. First of all, it rained. It rained from the time we got into the woods to the time we woke up this morning, and now it’s foggy and gray.
We couldn’t have recorded anything if we wanted to. We couldn’t make dinner. Which is fine, because we packed granola bars and such. But still, just not the night we wanted.
And the rain plays tricks on your ears. Scott freaked himself out thinking he was hearing popping and cracking sounds around our campsite, and then he freaked the rest of us out, too. Convinced something was going to ambush us and eat us in the middle of the night. We all know better, but it is disconcerting to listen to rain splatter everywhere and to know it’s impacting what else you can hear. Or rather, what else you can’t. It’s easy to think something’s there when it’s not. For Ryan and me, I think that might actually be exciting, but for the others, I think they’d rather not think about it.
Otherwise, an uneventful night. Hopefully the fog clears and we have better luck today.
In the meantime, I’ve started recording what I think are the standard conditions out here, at least as I can see them. Lots of twigs and leaf cover on the ground, rocky and uneven. Caves up on the hills. Might be worth exploring a few of those, just in case. It’s mostly quiet around here now, the calm after the storm, so to speak.
One major area of interest: There’s lots of mud near the river now. Could be a great place to find tracks.
September 17, 2022 (8:00 a.m.)
The fog never cleared yesterday, but today it’s sunny and bit warmer. It was frustrating to lose a day, though. I suggested we walk along the river and look for any signs there. Now all of our boots are covered in mud and Dan thinks I’m a crazy person.
Morning now, and so we’re trying to get an early start. I’ll come back to this later with any updates.
September 17, 2022 (7:00 p.m.)
Okay, so Dan’s actually really mad at me, and Scott’s being a weirdo. He’s insisting he saw tracks in the mud. I looked – I was hoping he was right – but honestly they just looked like puddles to me. Ryan looked, too, and wasn’t sure either way, and Laura snapped a couple of pictures, just in case. I told Scott there are lots of animals in these woods that we’re not searching for, and to just let it go.
Dan’s upset about his boots, and he’s also frustrated that I didn’t bring any wool socks. And he’s not wrong. I totally forgot. He’s loaned me his second pair, which means he doesn’t get dry socks. I feel bad. I don’t know. We’ve only got two more nights out here, and that’s counting tonight. We’re heading home on Monday. I think we’ll be fine.
In a bit of bad news, though, it’s starting to rain again. Hopefully it passes soon and we’re able to head out for an hour or so later this evening to do some searching in the dark. We’ve not had any luck during the day, so maybe we’ll do better at night?
September 18, 2022 (2:30 a.m.)
No dice on the night search. The rain won’t let up. And Scott’s convinced he’s hearing something out in the woods. He says it’s following us. It’s making everybody nervous, even Ryan. I thought he’d be interested, but he says we’d be better to leave it along, whatever it is. Dan thinks I’m being mean to Scott. Laura thinks Scott’s being paranoid, but I’ve seen her looking over her shoulder. I kind of can’t believe it. Dan, Laura, and Ryan are all pretty experienced hikers, so I didn’t think this would be a problem. I’m over here fuming, honestly, because this is so dumb, but I think maybe we all just need to get some rest. It’s not a been a great day, and we’re tired, but it won’t help anything to just sit here and scare ourselves and be irritated with each other.
This is not the experience that I wanted.
September 18, 2022 (5:00 p.m.)
Scott, Laura, and Ryan have all packed up and left. They’re going to hike to the closest town and catch a ride from there. So it’s just Dan and me. I love that man. He’s annoyed as hell, but he’ll stick with me. And at least Ryan left us his map.
Anyway, the others are leaving because this morning, when we woke up, there was a massive tree branch right outside of our tents. Like, right outside. I don’t know how it didn’t fall and kill all of us. Scott is convinced it was “the Bigfoots.” That’s what he’s been calling them. I’m not sad to see him go. I pointed out that it was just bad luck, that the rain’s been really heavy. But the others said it doesn’t matter. It’s clearly not safe out here right now, and it’s better to leave.
I don’t disagree with them. And I’m worried about Dan’s poor, wet feet. But it’s only one more night. We’re out of here tomorrow morning. I just don’t even feel like I’ve really had the chance to do what I came here to do. I haven’t searched any of the caves. I haven’t been able to record anything. I just can’t leave yet, not while I still have a chance.
The weather’s dried out. My plan is to head out tonight after dinner and bring the recorder and a camera. If I don’t find anything, then fine. I won’t be the first. But I can’t just give up.
September 18, 2022 (11:00 p.m.)
I’m stealing a minute because we heard them! Or, we heard something. I think it was a Bigfoot. Dan thinks it was a bear. But I got it on tape! And we’ve definitely been hearing some popping and cracking sounds out in the woods – maybe now that Scott’s not whining about it, I can hear it better? – so I think we might finally have some luck! I’m planning to check out some caves in the morning before we leave. But for now, I’m going to stay up, listen, and hope I get something good.
September 19, 2022 (1:00 a.m.)
I’m probably an idiot. I’m out in the woods. I’m taking a breathing break. But I can hear them. They’re out here. They’re close. I actually think I heard one of them following me. It almost sounded like it took a step for every step I took. Maybe it’s unwise, but I’m taking this chance, just hoping to get a picture. It’s true that I don’t have Laura’s awesome camera, but maybe I’ll get lucky enough to score something. Fingers crossed!
September 19, 2022 (9:00 a.m.)
We’re supposed to pack up and head back morning, but it’s pouring down rain. Pouring. I did manage to poke my head into a couple of caves last night, which was not the smartest thing to do, and I didn’t find anything anyway. But at least I’ve got the recordings.
We went to bed at about 3:00 last night, and when we woke up, I swear it looks like our tent is just in a whole different spot. It’s just the rain, I know.
Dan’s thinking maybe we should just wait out the weather. We’ve got enough supplies for one more night, and we’d both rather be safe than injured. I can’t lie – I’m elated after last night, and hoping that if we do stay, we’re able to get some real, definitive evidence.
Dan’s sick of wet feet.
September 19, 2022 (3:00 p.m.)
Well, we’re definitely not going anywhere today. We’ve packed up, and we’ve been trying to figure out where we are, but I swear, things just look different in the rain. It’s so foggy and damp, and it keeps pouring and then misting. Dan’s so frustrated. He can’t figure out WHY he can’t figure out where we are. We can’t even find the river. I’m a little scared, but I trust him, and he knows what he’s doing. I figure, If nothing else, we can set up camp tonight and try again in the morning, hopefully after the weather lets up. For now, we’re stopping and resting. It’s useless to just tire ourselves out for no reason.
I haven’t said anything, but I swear, I think Scott got into my head. I hear stuff. I hear stuff and I’m worried and I think it’s just the stress of being a little lost. I should be excited, because I swear I saw something big and hairy out of the corner of my eye as we were trying to figure out where we could set up. But I think it was just a tree. I think I’m just tired. I’ll probably write more later. Maybe the rain will let up and I can get in one more good night.
September 19, 2022 (8:00 p.m.)
We’ve eaten dinner, and Dan says we’re not going anywhere tonight. No searching. No recording. Just sitting, safe and quiet, in our tent. He’s convinced there’s a bear in the area, and it’s safest to stay where we are. I kind of hope it’s just a bear at this point. I was excited, but I’m feeling a little…stalked? I can’t think of the right word. But I’ve definitely felt some kind of shift in the air. I’m ready to go home. I’m going to turn in early, and hopefully in the morning, we’ll get out of here quickly.
************
September 20, 2022 (2:30 a.m.)
They’re hunting us.
************
Thank you for reading! This is the ninth of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
Here are the first eight, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
The next story will be posted at the end of October.
*I’m apparently making a habit of this. Here’s August’s short story, a little late but hopefully an enjoyable read. I aspire to not be late with September. We shall see.*
It started with the old church piano. I’m not sure how it made its way to our house, but one stormy, late summer day, it arrived via Mr. McCoy’s red and white pickup truck.
“A little serendipitous, isn’t it?” My mother stood in the doorway, watching Mr. McCoy and my father unload it. “It’s been raining all day, and that instrument gets here right as it stops.”
“Mmmm,” I answered, through a mouthful of cherry popsicle.
My sister said nothing. This was not unusual, as Callie hardly ever talked. She could, and sometimes at night, we’d sit together in our room and talk for hours. But she seldom wanted to. She told me once that most people talk too much and don’t say anything. I think I was probably one of those people, and I was fine to fill the silence in her place.
The day the piano came changed everything.
We didn’t have much room in our house, and so my mother decided the piano would sit in the dining room, scrunched against the back wall right behind the table. That first night, Callie stared at it all through dinner. Hard not to, given that it was massive and dark and made that back wall look a little like a cavern. But Callie looked curious, not concerned. At least, to me she did, and I’d like to think I knew her best.
“You can try it out,” my father told her. “Won’t do anybody any good if nobody plays it.”
She nodded.
“If you like it, maybe Mrs. Mavis down at the church can teach you to play.”
Callie nodded again.
As it would turn out, she didn’t need any help at all.
We all turned in that night at about 9:00. Callie went straight to bed, her back to me, and I sat at my desk in the corner of our room, working on a story about an old man I’d talked to outside of the general store. That was the thing with talking – people tell great stories. But Callie didn’t look at the world quite like me, and that was fine. I liked to think about her, to consider what she might be feeling. I liked figuring her out, I guess, and I was good at it.
Sometime later, hours maybe, I heard a rustle from Callie’s side of the room.
“Callie?” I whispered.
I got no answer. At first. Minutes later, I heard the distinct tink, tink, tink of one of the highest piano keys. Then the deep bellow of one of the lowest. I rolled out of bed and made my way downstairs, and in the darkness of that tiny dining room, saw Callie’s back, stick straight. There on the piano stool, for the first time in my life, and in hers, I’d wager, my sister looked right at home. I didn’t say a word. I just stood there in the dark, and watched her plink away. I’m sure my parents heard her, too, but they didn’t get up, and that morning, no one said a word.
I don’t much believe in magic, but I’ll say this: Whatever’s out there in the universe, whatever force exists to make me, me and you, you, it made Callie for music.
Every night for weeks, she’d tiptoe down the stairs, and she’d sit and plink.
“Driving me crazy,” my father would say.
“We should put her in lessons,” my mother would reply.
But Callie didn’t want lessons. She’d shake her head, fast and hard, anytime either one of them offered to take her.
“Why in the world not?” My mother finally asked her one night, whether out of frustration or curiosity I can’t say.
Callie didn’t answer at first. She just stared ahead. And then finally, slowly, she said: “I like the way I feel when I play.”
My mother shook her head – that was exasperation – and trudged into the kitchen to start dinner. But I understood, or, at least, I understood about as well as anybody.
“You feel free when you play, don’t you?”
Callie nodded.
“Like nobody can tell you what to do.”
She nodded again.
“That’s how I feel when I’m writing.”
Callie smiled, and we both went up to our room to do homework.
It was really as simple as that, in the moment. Whatever skill Callie developed at that piano, it would belong to only her. I was a little jealous, truth be told. Teachers were always picking apart my stories, looking for spelling mistakes and grammar errors. But sitting at the old church piano, Callie could be free. And free she was, like an animal in the forest, like a bird in flight. When she played, the rest of the world drifted away for her, and she went somewhere else.
Callie never talked much, but she played.
She played and played, and days became months became years. And as she played, she learned. She could read a page of music like I could read a page in a book, and I have no idea how she figured that out. The marks looked like chicken scratch to me. And she could create her own songs, too, sitting in the dim light on Sunday afternoons, just enjoying the intervals between sound and silence.
I asked her once, just flat out asked, how she decided what notes went with the others, and how she wanted the song to sound.
“I don’t know,” she said. “It just kind of comes to me, I guess.”
“Do you ever write it down?”
“No,” she answered. “Then it wouldn’t belong to me anymore.”
“My stories still belong to me,” I told her.
“In a way,” she said. “But they also belong to the people who read them.”
She was right, of course, though I’d never thought about it that way before. But I wish she’d written down just one song, even just a portion of one song, because when we were eighteen and just about to graduate from high school, Callie died.
I don’t know how else to say it. It’s strange how people sugar coat dying. She was alive one day, and then she wasn’t, and the silence in our house became unbearable. Callie never talked much, but her quiet was a calm quiet. Her music was her voice. And in her absence, in her place, this new quiet felt heavy and hard and sharp around the edges.
“This house just feels different now,” my mother said
It got to all of us, eventually. My father kept the television on. My mother sat by the radio in the kitchen.
“It’s something,” she said. “It not enough, but it’s something.”
And I – I suffered. My escape had always been my writing, but writing’s quiet, too, and I suddenly found that I just couldn’t stand it. I couldn’t stand sitting alone at my desk with only my own thoughts ringing in my ears, surrounded by Callie’s absence and the unbearable stillness she left behind.
And then one night, I’d had enough. I lay in the dark, in the room that now belonged to only me, and I thought, well, there’s only one thing for it, isn’t there?
I tiptoed downstairs to the dining room, and I sat on Callie’s piano stool. My hands shook, but I forced my fingers to the keys, and just like Callie had, all those years ago, I plinked. First the highest notes, then the lowest. Then some in the middle, and then a few together. And finally, I felt some of the tension leave my shoulders, felt my jaw unclench for the first time in weeks.
I will never be the musician that Callie was, but I’ve kept that piano all these years, and I sit down every day, and I play. When I play, it’s like a piece of her sits with me. And in the intervals between sound and silence, I can almost feel her there, whole and solid and alive again.
************
Thank you for reading! This is the eighth of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
Here are the first seven, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
The next story will be posted at the end of September.
*Here’s July’s short story, just a little bit late. Hopefully August will be less chaotic and stressful. Thank you for waiting patiently, and for reading!*
The river was my grandfather’s sanctuary. He was never much interested in church, or in people, but he loved that muddy brown water with every fiber of his being, and in it, I’d say he found the closest thing a human can ever find to God.
The river was his church, preacher, and pulpit, and his Bible was an old tackle box he got when he was just a kid, not much older than I was that very first time he took me fishing.
It had rained that week, big, fat, heavy drops for days. That didn’t matter. To my grandfather, the river was sacred and worthy, whether it was high or low, slow or rough, clear or thick and dark as molasses.
“We might not catch much,” he said.
“S’okay,” I answered.
“Well then, put on something long and light. Mosquitoes out today.”
“Yessir,” I said.
The sun had finally peeked out from the gray cloud cover, and while he didn’t mind to sit by the water’s edge on a damp day, my mother wouldn’t have allowed that behavior from me.
“You know full well that child will catch a cold and we’ll all be sick for two weeks,” she’d lectured, and my grandfather, patient man that he was, had sat there and listened with a calm face and kind eyes.
We set out after breakfast, gear and chairs in the bed of his old red and white Ford, and a cooler full of sandwiches and root beer, courtesy of my grandmother. She’d prepped an empty cooler, too, and filled it with ice.
As the truck rumbled down the holler road, I could feel my heart start to beat faster and faster. I was excited, sure, but I was not exactly an outdoorsy kind of kid. I guess in that way, I took after my mother. My grandfather had always loved wild things. I think he saw something of himself, some fundamental piece of who he was and how he connected to the world, in the chaos and the unpredictability of nature. I just found it frightening. And I think he knew that, because he looked over form the driver’s side and said, quietly, “Nothing out there in that water wants to hurt you.”
“I know,” I told him.
My first real experience with the river had been my big brother’s baptism earlier that year. He’d loved every minute of it, and said he felt washed clean. I’d sat at the water’s edge with my parents and counted the snakes I could see slithering just under its surface. No one else looked even a little bit bothered, but in my head, I could just feel them, scaly bodies twisting around my ankles, and I couldn’t get that fear out of my mind. My grandfather never seemed afraid of anything, especially when I was young.
We pulled up to his favorite spot right around the time when my hands started to shake, and as he got out to unload the car, I sat still in my seat.
“Come on now,” he coaxed.
“I just need a minute,” I said.
“You won’t feel any better in a minute than you do right now. Hop on out,” he answered.
I did as I was told. I’m ashamed now that I was so scared. I was ashamed then, too, though my grandfather always told me there was no shame in being afraid, so long as you did the thing that scared you so bad anyway. And here we were. This was his holy place. I trudged around the truck bed and grabbed a chair, and we plodded down the soggy bank to set up for the day.
“Over there,” he said, “up in that tree, you see it?”
I looked and shook my head.
“That’s an eagle’s nest,” he said. “And further up that way,” he pointed, “I spotted some muskrats the other day.”
I nodded.
“It’s warm,” he added, “so I reckon we’ll see some turtles out. They’ll be sleeping on logs.”
“My friend April has a turtle,” I said. “It lives in a tank.”
“Probably not a very happy animal,” my grandfather said. “Wild things belong outside.”
“She named it Leo,” I said.
“I guarantee you we’ll see a few Leos today,” he told me. “But what we’re really here for is fish.”
He propped up our chairs and set out the polls. He showed me how to add bait, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t force my fingers to handle that slimy, writhing worm. He noticed, and did it for me, and then he sat down with his own poll, and signaled me to do the same.
“What now, Grandpa?”
“Now,” he said, “we wait. And we talk. We think. And with any luck, we bring home dinner.”
I thought there would be more involved. Looking back now, I see why my grandfather loved his spot by the water so much. It was quiet. All around, I could hear birds, the breeze, little bugs skimming the surface. I listened for snakes, not quite sure what they might sound like, but eventually, I relaxed. I fell asleep, though I’m not sure for how long, and woke to the sound of my grandfather’s voice.
“You got one,” he yipped.
“What!” I cried.
“Reel in your line,” he said, excited and fast. “You caught one!”
I think instinct took over, and I reeled. I reeled for what felt like forever, and at the end of my line, dangling from the hook, I found a silvery blue fish, not much bigger than my palm.
“Want me to show you how to take it off?”
I nodded, and my grandfather walked me through the process of removing fish from hook. I tried, but as it squirmed around in my hand, I flinched. My grandfather laughed and said, “You already did the hard part.”
He took the line from me and pulled the fish, and dropped it in a cooler by his side.
“Did it hurt?”
“Huh?”
“The fish,” I said. “Did it hurt?”
My grandfather thought for a moment, and he answered, “I’m sure it did. But we’ll have food for the night.”
“Isn’t that mean?”
“We eat fish,” he said. “So do bears. Even other fish eat fish. Nature gives us what we need. It’s not mean to use it, not if you use it well.”
I’d never seen anything die before, and I thought of that poor fish, suffocating in the cooler. Years later, I would decide to forgo meat entirely, but when you’re little, you eat what you’re given. Or, as my grandmother used to say, you don’t eat at all.
We caught a few more over the course of the day, despite the murky water, and we did see several turtles resting in the sun. My grandfather explained the way of the river, the animals that called it home. He included himself in their number, I know now. We drove back late, just as the sun started to set, and pulled our dirty boots off on the carport.
“Good day?” My grandmother opened the screen door and ushered us inside. “You catch anything, June bug?”
I nodded and smiled. Though it hurt me to hurt an animal, I could tell my grandfather was proud.
“She’s a natural,” he said to my grandmother.
My grandmother fried up what we’d caught, not much but enough, especially supplemented with corn bread and green beans. We sat down to dinner that night, and eating something I’d caught did make me feel a kind of way. Not pleased, exactly, and not ashamed. Aware, maybe, is the best way I can think to describe it.
I think my grandfather had planned more fishing trips for us. I know he wanted to share that with me, but that’s not the way it turned out. A few weeks later, my parents told me we were moving, and my only visits to my grandparents after that were always too short. Holidays, weekends – never enough time. I have that one memory of him in his favorite place, and I cherish it. I’m not wild, and at the end of the day, I suppose, neither was he. Not really. But when I think of him, I think of the river, deep and wide and full, and I can feel it flowing in me, too.
************
Thank you for reading! This is the seventh of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
Here are the first six, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
The next story will be posted at the end of August.
I remember dandelion greens. In the warming days of spring and the sweltering days of summer, dandelion greens – stewed, fried, sauteed, cold and crunchy with salt and vinegar in my favorite red-rimmed bowl – growing wild all around the hillside and down into valley. Sweating under the white hot sun, pulling dandelion greens from the thick, fragrant grass with my small, sticky hands beside my mother, stooped over to find the very best, the very plumpest, the very brightest.
I remember those days with my mother. Daddy worked nights at the mine, and he’d come home early in the morning covered from head to toe in coal dust. We’d wait for him together in the kitchen, eager and relieved to hear the roar of his engine coming up the driveway. He’d kick his boots off on the carport, and my mother would open the door for him and kiss his blackened cheek.
“Good night and good morning,” she’d tell him.
“Good morning, Daddy,” I’d pipe in from my spot at the table in the corner.
Mama named me Louise after her grandmother, but Daddy always called me Weed.
“I think you’re even taller than yesterday,” Daddy would say to me.
He’d smile at Mama, get cleaned up, and we’d eat our breakfast together before he went to bed for the day and my mother and I got to the important business of running the house. And in the early evenings, before he went back to work, we’d all sit down together for a dinner that Mama and I planted and gathered and cooked.
I knew plenty of other children whose fathers worked in the mine, and though we didn’t show it on the outside, on the inside, we were an anxious and sorry lot. I got used to seeing my friends pulled away from the classroom during the day, always for some tragic news. That, at least, I didn’t have to worry about. But the fear that Daddy wouldn’t come home in the morning, that we’d never sit at our little table and laugh over buttered grits and field greens again, that fear never left me.
“Can’t Daddy do something else?”
My constant question.
“What do you think he should do instead?”
My mother’s answer.
I didn’t know what he might do instead. But I sure knew that I’d rather have him home and safe, even if it meant we had to eat dandelion greens every day for the rest of our lives.
When eventually the inevitable happened, I can’t remember that I was surprised. We got the call in the early hours of the morning that there’d been an accident, and that Daddy had been injured. He was alive, which felt most important, but he’d be laid up for months. His back, Mama said.
“I’m fine,” he told us. “It’ll take more than some faulty equipment and a stroke of bad luck to lick me.”
Mama nodded, but picked at her fingernails. I said nothing.
Daddy must have seen the worry on my face, because he added, “You and me, Weed, we’re as hardy as they come.”
Mama got a job. She had to. But she told me it wouldn’t be so bad, and that I could come with her when I wasn’t in school, because she’d be watching a little boy about my age, and we could play together while she cleaned the house.
“Who is he?” I asked.
“You don’t know him,” my mother answered, “because he goes to school at home. He has his own teacher.”
“Is he nice?”
“I’m sure he is,” Mama said. “I’ve been told he has very good manners.”
I winced. Manners weren’t something we talked about all that much.
“Oh, don’t look like that, Louise. He’s not a different species. Y’all will get along just fine.”
Mama was hardly ever wrong, but no one’s right all the time.
The first day I met the boy, I found him sitting in his back yard, setting up empty cola bottles on the lip of an old stone well. On the covered porch, I saw a toy bow and arrow.
“You a good shot?” he asked me.
“Don’t know,” I said. “I’ve never tried.”
“I’ll show you,” he said. “I’m Malcolm.”
“Louise,” I answered.
“Wheeze?”
“No! Loo-eeze.”
“That’s a funny name,” he said.
“It isn’t,” I insisted.
“Well, I’ve never heard it before, so it must be,” he said.
Things did not improve from there. Malcolm was a good shot, and he tried to teach me, but he had a critique for every little thing I did, even beyond backyard archery.
“You’re eating your soup wrong,” he told me one day at lunch.
“What’s wrong with how I eat?”
And days later, “That’s not how you’re supposed to climb trees.”
“Well, why don’t you show me, if you’re so good at it,” I retorted.
“I’m not allowed,” he said. “But I know wrong when I see it.”
All the while, Mama worked away in his house, one of the largest in town, and she did it with a smile on her face, even when he only had a sneer for her.
“My mother says the curtains were dusty yesterday,” he told her one afternoon.
“Well,” my mother said, keeping her voice as mild and as even as I’d ever heard it, “I’ll make extra sure to get them clean today.”
Driving back to our own place that night, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut any longer.
“Malcolm’s mean and snobby,” I told her. “I don’t know why you put up with him.”
“Louise,” she started.
But I couldn’t stop. “If I acted that way, you’d make me go and pull my own switch. He’s not nice, Mama.”
“I know that, honey,” she said. She brushed a hand through her hair. “But I’m going to tell you something important, so listen real close, okay?”
“Okay,” I said.
“Sometimes, we have to do things we don’t like, and we have to put up with people we don’t like, because there are more important things than our feelings. Your daddy can’t work right now. We need money. I’d work for someone half as nice as Malcolm and his mother if I had to, because right now, that’s what I can do to take care of us. Understand?”
I nodded, my face aflame and shame radiating from every part of my body. Mama was always looking out for us.
“You don’t have to come with me if you don’t want to,” she went on, “but I like knowing you’re close by. And maybe you can teach Malcolm a thing or two. You know, his world is real small, smaller than mine or yours or Daddy’s. His mother thinks that’s best, but maybe he’s mean because he doesn’t know any better.”
I went to work with Mama the next day resolved to do better myself, and I decided that I could start by trying to be nice to Malcolm. Maybe I could teach him something. And so when we went out back to play after lunch, I told him all about Mama’s garden and how we’d grow things to eat, and how I was learning to cook. And as I made us crowns out of white wildflowers, I told him all about dandelion greens.
“They’re kind of like these,” I said, and pointed to the flowers I was picking. “They grow wild, but they taste real good.”
While my fingers weaved delicate stems together, I told him about the afternoons Mama and I spent outside together, how that was our time to talk and sing and laugh, and how proud I was that Mama knew so much about plants and how to find the best ones. Then I popped the finished crowns on his head and mine and said, “We match!”
“You’re so weird, Louise,” he said. He got up and walked inside, and left me in his back yard to wonder what on earth I’d done wrong this time.
I didn’t go back to work with Mama the next day, or any of the days after that. While she was gone, I missed her fiercely. I looked after Daddy, and in the evenings, I made us dinner on my own, as best I could. Eventually, Malcolm’s family moved away.
“Somewhere up near Richmond,” Mama said.
Daddy got strong again and went back to work, and Mama and I resumed our usual routine. One day, out in the heat gathering stinging nettle for soup, I asked her: “Do you ever wonder what’ll happen to Malcolm?”
She stood up straight and thought for a moment. Then she said, “I imagine he’ll live some kind of life. Not like us, but it’ll be something.”
Sometimes, when I think back on those days, I wonder about Malcolm, about where he ended up and what kind of man he is today. I wonder about Mama and Daddy, too. I wish I could ask them questions. I wish I could go back, even for a minute, even for a second, and feel the hot sun on my back, the dew and dirt on my fingers. The fact of the matter is, we ate dandelion greens because they were free. They sprung up around us like lightning bugs in June, and it cost us nothing to gather food from our own land. Nothing but time.
I think back, and I wish I’d had more of that time. I’d spend hours now, if I could, picking dandelion greens. Maybe it’s true what they say, despite this mean old world and the people in it like Malcolm and his mother. Maybe the best things in life really are free.
************
Thank you for reading! This is the sixth of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
Here are the first five, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
*A quick note: This is May’s short story, just a little late. I hope to not make this a habit. I think history lovers will particularly enjoy this one, which is based very loosely on a true story. Thank you for reading!*
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Night time is the worst time. At night, I can hear, but I can’t see, and the soldiers sound like wild animals in the dark woods. I know they’re out there, but I can’t tell where. I wonder if we’re safe. Sometimes I wonder if we’ll ever truly feel safe again.
No one really believed the war would come. Maybe some did, but I certainly didn’t. Here in the valley, things like war and politics have always felt like villains out of a story book. We’ve settled our disagreements for years like civilized people. We’ve lived that way, too. And now it’s my job to protect us. Not with a gun and a uniform, but with my silence. No one suspects a widow.
When the ledger came to me, it came by chance. I’ll never forget that day, because that was the day everything changed, and amid the smoke and dust, the cries and the acrid smell of blood and gunpowder in the air, I found the one thing I can do. Women can’t go to war, can’t take up arms with our husbands and sons and march to the front. This I know all too well, because I’ve lost them both, my husband and my boy, and there was nothing I could do for them, no help I could render as they lay dying alone on a field far away. My hands were empty then. Now they hold the simplest treasure, and I will never let it go.
Mr. Partlow had always kept the ledger, neat and tidy and itemized, tucked away in a drawer in the apothecary he’d run since his father left it to him three decades ago. He was a good man, Mr. Partlow, and a fastidious record keeper. He could tell you who had the most coal, the biggest harvest of carrots and potatoes, the greatest quantity of grain, the healthiest livestock, and he facilitated those trades fairly and quickly, and noted everything in the ledger. At the time, those records meant security, knowing who had what, who could trade, who to come to in dire straits. You could say he kept the valley running. The day he died, the day of the first raid, he didn’t even have time to put on his apron. It was pure luck that I found the ledger before the enemy.
And pure luck, days later, that they didn’t take it from me.
The day the enemy came to call, the sun rose hot and heavy and bright white against the deep blue sky. It was too beautiful a day for the grief and anger hanging in the valley, but only God controls the weather. Maybe he was mocking us. I spotted the soldiers from my garden, five of them approaching from the east. I dropped the hoe and made for the house, but they reached me at the porch and blocked the door.
“Ma’am,” the tallest said.
“Sir,” I answered back, bile rising in my throat and dread in my belly.
“We hoped to trouble you for some water.”
That’s how they came to be at my table, looking for all the world like friendly neighbors sharing the latest gossip. I knew all along it wasn’t water they were after.
I sat in the corner, kept my hands busy with the beans I’d planned for dinner, and my mouth fastened shut. I owed them no kindness.
“It’s just you then, ma’am,” the tallest said. He didn’t ask. He declared.
“It is,” I answered.
“All alone out here,” he said. He looked around the room, scanning each shelf and corner.
“Didn’t have much choice,” I told him.
“Must be hard, running this farm on your own. Hard to get what you need.”
So mild, so very conversational. Here was a lion stalking its prey. I would not be so easily outmaneuvered.
“I manage,” I said.
“No help from neighbors?”
“What neighbors would you be referring to?” I gestured out the window, to the empty meadows and the deserted road.
He barked a laugh, as did his comrades, and then all became quiet.
I shelled beans and looked down, kept my eyes away from his and my face a mask of calm, but my mind whirred in an anxious frenzy, wondering where I’d left the ledger. That single document, a record of everything everyone had, of what could be stolen, exploited, ransomed, killed for, and here it was in my house, in my hands, a hair’s breath away from those who’d do us harm. My mind’s eye scoured each room and found it upstairs, open and exposed, atop my unmade bed. I’d spent the last night reading it, reminiscing better days, recalling faces I’d never see again. Here was danger, so close, right out in the open. I couldn’t know what they wanted, couldn’t be sure they knew about the ledger, but I knew if they were here at all, they must be after something. Something more, anyway, than just water and a few minutes in my far from pleasant company.
“I’m sure you know the value of good neighbors just the same,” said the tallest.
“I suppose,” I replied.
“Then I suppose,” he said, “that you wouldn’t mind if we took a look around. We’re running low on supplies, see, and it would be very neighborly of you to offer us what you can.”
“I…” I stammered.
“We won’t be long,” he said. “I’ll just send the boys around. Quick and quiet as mice.”
I looked closely, for the first time, at the faces of the others. Young men, all of them, tired and dirty. One looked like he might fall where he stood. I could only hope he would be the one to scour the bedroom. Either way, I knew, I had no choice. So I said, “Do what you must,” and watched these strangers as they set about searching my home and stealing what little I had left. I prayed. I prayed and begged any higher power who might listen that they would overlook the ledger.
“They’re good young men,” said the tallest, who’d stayed behind, doubtless to ensure that I would stay put and not attack with some hidden weapon while his men were distracted.
I didn’t reply.
“Terrible business,” he added.
“Yes,” I said.
I could hear them, boots clomping upstairs, drawers opening and closing, cabinets squeaking and slamming. The minutes ticked by, each an eternity of worried torture. And then, they were done. The men returned to the table with sacks full of goods I couldn’t see, and the tallest thanked me and bid me goodbye.
“Stay safe,” he told me, as they stepped off my porch. I watched their backs until I could no longer see them, until they became as small and harmless as flies. I wished I could crush them just as easily.
“Go to Hell,” I said.
I tore into the house and took the stairs two at a time. I didn’t care about what else they might have taken, what chaos they left in their wake. I only cared about the ledger. I reached my bedroom, saw my blanket gone, and my sheets and pillows. But there, thank merciful Jesus, there on the dressing table sat the ledger, still wide open. Relief flooded my veins, washed over me like a spring rain, and I took my first full breath since I’d seen those soldiers coming my way.
I hid the ledger that night. I won’t say where, not even here, not even to myself. But it’s somewhere safe, somewhere, I hope, no one will think to look. And when this is over, joyful when this is over, it will still be there. I can’t return it to poor Mr. Partlow, but I know someone will keep it, when there is peace in the valley again.
************
The Valley Chronicle, June 17, 2022
Contractors working to restore the old Poston House have made a remarkable discovery in the walls of the home.
“It’s pretty incredible,” said George Roberts, head of the project. “I’ve never had a find quite like this.”
Work began as usual on Monday morning, starting first on the old chestnut staircase. Hidden in the wall between the floor and the lath and plaster, just above the top step, they found what local historians believe to be the town’s Civil War-era ledger, a record of all trades and barters that opens an invaluable and fascinating window into the past.
“It’s truly a rare gift to have this artifact in our hands,” said Roy Galloway, curator of the valley’s Museum of Pioneer Life and beloved high school history teacher.
Mr. Galloway believes that Mrs. Gayle Poston, owner of the home at the time of the Civil War, hid the ledger for safekeeping.
“It would have put the whole community in danger,” he said. “She was a clever woman to hide it like she did.”
As for why the item was still there, Mr. Galloway says that when she died in 1864, before the end of the war, she likely hadn’t shared its secret location.
“No one knew,” he said. “That’s all I can think. Otherwise, we certainly wouldn’t have found it here today.”
Plans are currently being made to restore and preserve the ledger, after which it will be displayed in the museum for public viewing.
“Just incredible,” Mr. Roberts repeated, before getting back to work. He says the home should be complete and ready for its next owner by the fall of this year.
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Thank you for reading! This is the fifth of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
Here are the first four, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
*A quick note: This is April’s short story, just a little late. Life happens, right? Anyway, enjoy, and be sure to check back at the end of the month, when I’ll post a story for May!!*
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The heat came first. It scorched the newly green grass and wilted the daffodils to brown, drooping husks, and we all sat and languished under the bright, white sun. We couldn’t remember a spring drought so long and miserable. And so when the rain came, first as only a gentle patter, all we felt was the sweet sense of damp, cool, long overdue relief.
On the day the heavy gray clouds rolled in, just after lunchtime, Mr. Holley’s rickety tan truck made its way down the gravel holler and up our driveway. We heard him coming long before we caught sight of him. Mama was sitting on the carport, stringing beans for dinner, and I was at her feet, playing jacks.
“Afternoon, Mr. Holley,” Mama said.
Holley tipped his straw hat and told her, “Y’all better get ready.”
“What for?” This was me, my head tilted up and my hands stilled for a moment. The jacks and ball lay strewn around my scabbed-over knees.
Old Mr. Holley was known to all of us to be a little different. No one would call him crazy, not exactly, but he just seemed to look at the world in a way that others around the valley couldn’t understand. I thought he might be some kind of magic. Mama thought he was touched in the head, which is a thing we used to say, back then. Whatever the case, when Mr. Holley came to your door with a warning, you were just as likely to listen as not, depending on the day of the week and whether the sun had come up that morning.
“Rain’s fixin’ to pick up,” Holley said. “I reckon it’ll flood by Thursday.”
“After all this heat,” Mama said, “a good rain won’t hurt.”
“A little would be fine,” Holley said. “But I’m telling you, expect a flood. A big one.”
Mama nodded and said, “We’ll make sure we have oil and some water in the tub.”
Mr. Holley moved on after that, up and down the hollers and all through the valley, and despite his warnings, we just weren’t all the worried. No one could remember the valley ever having flooded, not in their grandparents’ time, or their grandparents’ grandparents’ time.
The rain started in the evening, just before dinner.
“Good for the apple trees,” said Pa, home from his day shift at the garage. “Especially after the drought.”
Mama told him what Mr. Holley had said, and Pa just shook his head and sighed.
“That poor man,” he said. “I remember him from when I was a little boy. Not quite right, but he’s always been a gentle soul.”
And that was that, at least for a few days. Mama didn’t make sure we had extra lamp oil or food, didn’t fill the tub with water, and Pa didn’t much worry about the house.
“Even if it did flood,” he said, “and it won’t…”
Here, he looked at me, his face calm and steady and brave.
“…but even if it did, we’re high up enough here that we’ll be just fine. Don’t you worry.”
Still, the rain didn’t stop. That first night, it fell in fits and starts, light showers and big, slow drips. But as the days wore on, sodden and muddy, it grew. Mists became walls, drips burst wide open into waterfalls, and I sat by the window, watching and waiting, afraid that Mr. Holley might just have been right after all.
Mama spotted me as she came through with the vacuum cleaner.
“Don’t you worry,” she told me.
“But it’s never rained like this before,” I said.
“Oh, it has. Trust me. I’ve been around a while longer than you.”
She put her hand on my shoulder and gave it a squeeze, and left a kiss on the top of my head. And even though she smiled at me, I could see something behind her eyes. Something tense and tight and all coiled up. I know now that it looked a lot like worry.
That night, sitting around the table eating soup beans and cornbread, we got the first report. It came from Mrs. Fugate, who lived just around the corner from the old red barn by the road. She’d walked over with a basket of oatmeal cookies, now drenched beyond recognition. Her shoes showed it, and she apologized up and down for tracking mud all over Mama’s kitchen floor.
“I sure am sorry,” she said, every word coming out faster and faster. “I just felt like I had to let you know. There’s water over by the wayside, out on the highway.”
“It can’t be that bad,” Mama said.
“The Warners and the Blackwells have gone to stay with family up the mountain. Left this afternoon.”
“Oh,” Mama said, and sat down in the nearest chair.
“They’re saying it’ll head towards town next. Jonas and I are leaving in the morning. Better safe than sorry.”
Mrs. Fugate left in a bigger hurry than when she came in, still apologizing for the mess, and Mama looked at Pa.
“We’ll be fine,” he said, and walked into the living room.
We heard the TV click on, and the droning sound of the news.
“Go on to bed,” Mama told me. “And don’t be afraid. Linda Fugate’s always going on about something.”
I tried to sleep that night. I tried my hardest. But all I could hear was the never-ending whirr of the rain, and all I could picture when I closed my eyes was water, a frightening rush of dark, powerful water. I’d never thought much about it before, but it hit me pretty hard that night, as I lay in the dark, that I didn’t know how to swim.
We woke up that morning on an island.
“How…” whispered Mama.
All around us, brown, muddy water lapped at the hillside. Pa stared at it from the carport.
“We’re high enough,” he said.
“Thank goodness,” Mama replied. “But what about everybody else? Oh, those poor people!”
“Nothing we can do,” Pa said. “Nothing but wait.”
In a million years, I don’t think we could have ever imagined this. People chose the valley because it was peaceful, because it was quiet, because it snowed just right in winter, and rained just right in spring, and the lightning bugs came out every year by the first day of summer vacation. There were no surprises in the valley, and life could go on day to day to day with certainty and rhythm.
“God almighty,” Mama whispered.
And we all just stood, stock still and in shock, until the terrible silence was broken by the hum, somewhere off in the distance, of a motor.
“Who on earth…” started Pa.
But we knew. We knew who. And it was no surprise when Mr. Holley rounded the corner in a small wooden boat, big enough for himself and maybe four other people.
“Holley,” called Pa.
“Mornin’,” Mr. Holley called back.
He pulled as close as he could get to the house. We could see that he had bags and boxes with him.
“I’ve just dropped off medicine for Ms. Amos,” he said.
“She’s okay?” Mama wringed her hands.
“Oh, fine. I told her what was coming same day I told you. She was ready.”
“Do you know about any others?” Pa asked.
“I’ve checked on most everybody,” Mr. Holley said. “The Fugates left last night. Only y’all and the Taylors left to go.”
“Holley,” Pa said, “how in the world did you come by a boat?”
“I built it,” Mr. Holley said. “Knew I’d need it. Just felt like the right thing to do.”
“You built it…” Mama said. And then she laughed out loud.
“Don’t y’all worry too much now,” Mr. Holley said, as if he hadn’t heard her at all. “Rain’s set to stop tonight. I reckon it might take a few days for the water to recede, but I brought y’all some water and jerky.”
“Thank you,” Mama said. “Thank you so much, Mr. Holley.”
“I have to get going now,” he said. “Still have to check on the Taylors, like I said, and Beula Price needs some kibble for the hounds.”
“Sure,” Pa said.
“I can drop back by, if you need anything,” Holley offered.
“I think we’ll be fine,” Pa answered. “But you keep yourself safe, Holley.”
We said some quick goodbyes, and Mr. Holley pulled away in his ramshackle boat and was out of sight within a minute.
“Well, I never…” started Mama.
“I know,” said Pa.
“How do you reckon he knew?”
“Good guesser?” Pa said. “Either that, or we all need to start really listening to Mr. Holley, don’t we?”
The floodwaters were gone in days, and the rain tapered off to reveal beautiful, blue, sunny skies. The destruction, the mess and the mud, it was a sight, but everyone, and I mean everyone was safe. Even Beula Price’s hounds. The papers called it a miracle. Mama did, too, and Pa always listened a little closer when Mr. Holley came to call.
To this day, if it weren’t in the record, I’d think it was all a dream. The valley has never seen that kind of weather again, and I doubt it will, even in the future. We still call it Holley’s Flood, not because he predicted it, and who can really be sure he did? But because he looked after all of us, because he saw fit to stay and help, even though, by some feat of guessing or magic, he knew it was coming. And when I look at the world now, I hope it’s full of Mr. Holleys, and of people just strange enough to listen to them.
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Thank you for reading! This is the fourth of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
Here are the first three, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
The winter ground had thawed and gone warm and soft on Spring Mountain when my grandmother first told me about the child.
“Wild as a fox at midnight,” she said. “But pretty as a picture.”
We were walking together from the church in town to the pharmacy on a sunny Sunday morning. My grandmother needed to pick up some medicine for my grandpa, and she’d promised me a Cherry Fizz if I came along quietly.
“Who was she, granny?”
“Well, here in town, they reckon she came from up on the mountain. No one’d ever seen her before.”
“But how’s that even possible? A little kid couldn’t live up there all alone.”
“Well, I never said she was alone,” my grandmother answered me, “now did I?”
“So she had a family?”
“No one knew,” my grandmother said. “She just appeared one day, like she’d been here all along. She sat out by the old ball field and watched the boys play a while, then she wandered off again.”
“What’d she look like?”
“She was just a little thing,” my grandmother said. “She had light blonde hair and blue eyes. Some people said she looked like she wasn’t quite of this world.”
We’d turned into the pharmacy by now, and my grandmother shopped while I sat at the counter with my Cherry Fizz.
“…holdin’ out long as he can…”
That was Granny.
“…making arrangements?”
Mr. Stevens, the pharmacist.
I knew they were talking about my grandfather. He’d been sick for a long time, as long as I’d been alive, it felt like. Other kids got to fish, or play ball, but my grandpa had never been well enough for any of that. So we played chess, and watched his shows, and drank Mountain Dew floats together on the front porch. I wanted him to live forever, but lately, his hands were too shaky and sore for board games, and he’d fall asleep in the middle of the news. He always told me you should watch the news. I knew Mr. Stevens and my grandmother were talking about Grandpa, and I didn’t like what I was hearing.
“Granny,” I yelled. “You done?”
My grandmother sauntered over and looked at me, stern and sharp, and said, “You remember our deal?”
“Yes’m,” I said, my head bowed.
“Just sit quiet until I’m done. Won’t be long, I promise.”
I did as I was told, and I did my best to tune out everything around me until I felt Granny’s hand on my shoulder.
“Ready steady,” she said.
“Ready,” I told her.
We set off towards Granny’s house, two blocks away and a couple of streets back.
“Granny,” I said.
“Hmmm,” she replied. She seemed somewhere far away, I thought.
“How’d you meet Grandpa?”
“I liked to run,” she said.
“Huh?”
“When I was a little girl,” she said, “I liked to run. I could outrun any of the boys, easy, and they didn’t much care for that. Or for me.”
“I can’t imagine anyone not liking you,” I said.
And I really couldn’t. My grandmother made dinners for the sick and carried groceries for the weak and always had candy in a crystal jar on the coffee table. She ran church luncheons like no one else could. She took the time to decorate every little part of her house at Christmas. Who wouldn’t like her?
“Things were different back then,” she said. “I was different.”
“Different how?”
“Well, I was new, for one thing. My family moved here when I was about seven. They kept to themselves, and that was different.”
“Okay,” I said. “But different doesn’t mean bad.”
“No, it sure doesn’t,” she said. “But I think we sort of scared people, my folks and me. I liked being outside, playing in the creek and getting my hands dirty. I liked the way the dirt felt, like it was something alive.”
“Ew,” I said.
“And I liked worms and bugs,” she added, and looked down at me with a toothy grin.
“Gross!”
“I didn’t go to school, since my parents taught me at home. I didn’t know a lot of people, but I sure liked to run, and I’d come into town every Saturday to play with the other kids.”
“They weren’t scared?”
“Oh, they were. But I think they wanted to prove they were brave,” she said. “They liked the challenge. Boys…” she said.
“So how’d you meet Grandpa, then?”
“Your grandpa was never much of a runner,” Granny said. “He’d sit off to the side, and he never really talked to me, but every time I won a race, he’d smile.”
“He liked you,” I said, in that kind of sing-song voice that kids always use.
“I reckon he did,” she said. “And one day, I sat down and said hello.”
“What’d he say back?”
“I guess it was hello,” Granny answered. “But you know, I don’t much remember, because we were always together after that, and we talked about a lot of things. I remember all of that, but not the first thing he said to me. Isn’t that sad?”
“Yeah,” I told her. “It is.”
“He didn’t like to run, but he did like the woods, and so he’d come up the mountain with me and we’d walk and talk. I’d show him my favorite bugs, and he’d show me his favorite flowers.”
“Grandpa doesn’t go in the woods anymore,” I said.
“No,” Granny replied. “No, he can’t move around like he used to. But we had lots of good years up in those woods.”
“I like that,” I said.
“I did, too,” she said. “I like our house just fine, but I love the mountain. Your grandpa does, too.”
“So that’s why you married him, then? Because he liked the woods?”
Granny laughed. “Oh, sweet pea,” she said, “there were all sorts of reasons. He liked the woods, and he liked me, and he was even nice to my parents. Came all the way up to their cabin and asked my father if he could marry me. Wasn’t one bit scared.”
“Do you miss those days?”
She looked out and ahead, and sighed. “I do, all the time. But I’m happy with life here. It’s darn good, in fact. Grandpa says he tamed me, and I say I couraged him.”
We walked for a bit in silence, until we got to their house. Grandpa and Granny lived in a brown and tan Craftsman cottage with a big front porch and a yard full of flowers. I loved that house. I love it, still.
We walked up the steps and Granny was just about to open the door. I looked up at her, at her long, light hair, tied in a bun on the nape of her neck. At her blue eyes that wrinkled when she laughed big.
“Granny,” I started, and then stopped myself. Even young as I was, I thought it wasn’t possible, and then I thought, well, if she wanted to tell me, one day she would.
“Go on now,” she said. “You can’t be starting something and not finishing. Ask what you wanted.”
“Are you her? The girl from the mountain. Is that you?”
She laughed again, a big, wide laugh and slapped her knee. “Oh, lord, child, is that what you think?”
I shook my head, vigorously. But then, I nodded, just small enough for her to see.
“If’n I was,” she said, “I’d tell you this: There’s a little wild in all of us, no matter where we come from.” And then, she winked.
I’d like to think my grandmother was the little wild child from Spring Mountain. I’d like to think she never lost that part of her, and that some part of me carries it, too.
************
Thank you for reading! This is the third of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
Here are the first two, if you’d like to read them:
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
The next story will be posted at the end of April.
Once upon a time, the queen of the faeries fell in love with the king of the coffee shops.
They lived in a different kind of forest, where the tall trees were made of metal and brick, and the meandering paths were dark as pitch and hard as rock. This forest was loud and fast. The queen and the king knew of no other world, no better world, than this land of perpetual motion, this place that never slept.
It so happened that on the night the queen first saw the king, the forest lay blanketed in a wet, heavy tarp of snow, and the wind blew frigid and swift through the corridors of steel and stone. From her perch above the world, looking down upon her kingdom from the highest of the towers, the queen saw the king, wrapped tightly in his winter coat and bracing himself against the icy gale.
And she thought to herself that she’d never encountered a living thing more handsome.
But the queen of the faeries knew very little about humans, and so she devised a plan. In the days that followed, she watched him, followed him from his small room into the busy streets, memorized his daily rhythms, studied his life. Soon enough, the cold days turned warm and soft, and the air filled with the scent of blossoms and new life. The queen decided the time had come.
“This is foolish,” said one of her attendants, as she pulled a brush through the queen’s thick mane of hair.
“She’ll be bored of him soon enough,” answered another. “Human lives are short and sad.”
But the queen would not be deterred. That morning, as the sky turned pale and light, she gathered her closest confidantes around her and said: “I am not certain how long I might be away, but I must go. Be well, and think of me.”
And she turned away and left them. Had she stayed, she would have noticed their scoffing, giggling, the worry and doubt on each wary face.
“This will not end well,” she would have heard whisper.
The queen was not afraid, though she was not unafraid either. There was a new feeling in her heart, something fierce and unrelenting, begging to be set free. Love, she knew. Love, she’d heard, sends ships to the ends of the earth, men to their deaths, and now, she thought, a queen into a great unknown.
The brass bell above the door to King’s Coffee jingled a merry chime as she walked through it, hands trembling, face aflame. But she would do this. She approached him, the king, there behind the counter, and took a breath to speak.
“Morning,” he said, before she’d gathered her words. “Beautiful today, right? What can I get you?”
The queen had prepared for this moment.
“A cappuccino,” she answered. “Extra foam.”
And she smiled, her brightest, biggest smile, one that had melted hearts and broken armies, one that demanded notice, demanded a reaction, demanded submission.
“Sure,” he said. He looked away from her, down and to the left. He met her eyes again with a cup and a marker in his hand. “Name for that order?”
This, thought the queen, was not going according to plan.
“Um,” the queen began.
“Uma?”
“No,” said the queen. “My apologies. You may call me Anna.”
“Got it,” he said, and scribbled something illegible on the cup.
“And yours?”
“Excuse me?”
“Your name,” said the queen. “It is only fair, a name for a name.”
“That’s a new one,” said the king. And then he smiled back at her, just a quick flash, there and gone. Enough for a hope. And he said, “It’s Nick.”
Love had a name, thought the queen. “Nick,” she repeated. “It’s wonderful to meet you, Nick.”
“Same,” he said, but added, with a note of apology in his voice, “it is. But, uh, if you could move down. There are other customers.”
The queen looked behind her then, and saw a long line of irritated faces. And someone elbowed her, actually elbowed her, out of the way.
These creatures, she thought, are beastly.
She waited at one side of the counter, and when her name was called, realized it was not Nick who would hand her cup to her.
“Thank you,” she said, nonetheless, and walked out, head down, and into the spring air.
A lesser being might feel discouraged. A weaker one might use magic.
“And I could,” the queen said to herself. “I could, and this would be done. He would be mine.”
But the queen did not want a king compelled to love her. What purpose in that? And so she returned, day after day, determined to know him better, and to win his heart.
The first morning she returned to King’s Coffee, Nick did not recognize her.
“Morning,” he’d said. “What can I get you?”
“Anna,” she told him.
“Right! Anna.”
“Cappuccino,” she said. “And thank you, Nick.”
He smiled, and she felt it again. Hope. There was hope.
The queen spent most of her time in King’s Coffee after that, though Nick did not always realize it. One day, glamoured as a tall, thin woman with dark hair and blue eyes, and the next, as a woman short, stout, and fair, today one person, tomorrow another, and each morning, always, just Anna, ordering her coffee. Nick’s routines were simple and kind. He’d help one customer, then the next, always with a cheery smile and a ready greeting. But the queen found she was not, as a whole, very fond of people. For every person who accepted Nick’s gentle friendliness, there seemed to be one who recoiled, who snapped, who grimaced and cursed.
One morning, ordering her “usual,” as Nick called it, she told him, “I want you to know that I find you an exceptionally nice person, Nick.”
She saw it, knew she hadn’t imagined that Nick’s cheeks had begun to turn a delightful shade of pink.
“Just doing my job,” he said.
“Well,” the queen added, “then you do your job much better than I would. I would not have the patience.”
Nick laughed, and how the queen loved the sound of it. “You’d surprise yourself, I bet,” he told her.
“Perhaps,” said the queen.
“Service isn’t a great job,” Nick told her, “not all the time, anyway. But I get to meet a lot of people, and most of them really are fine. Some are them are great.” He winked as he added, “Like you.”
The queen decided to sit down that day, as herself, at a little table in the corner. She caught Nick’s eye a few times, as he worked, and each time, it seemed some message passed between them, something more, better, something thrilling. She was drawn out of her reverie by a familiar voice.
“They are a rough and mannerless bunch, are they not?”
The queen’s eyes focused on her closest friend, sitting comfortable in the seat across from her, as if she’d been there the whole time.
The queen nodded and said, “Some of them, yes.”
“You must come home,” her friend said. “Your people need you.”
The queen closed her eyes, rubbed her temples, a decidedly human behavior she had somehow acquired, and said, “I can’t. I won’t. My heart will not allow it.”
“Your heart will destroy all that you have built.”
“Then let it,” said the queen. “I cannot tame it.”
Especially not now. Not now that something was shifting, changing. The queen could feel it. She was close, her goal in sight. Her love, her hope, near enough to reach out and touch. Almost.
The queen woke the next day determined. She would move this forward, and by the end of this day, she and her king would “have plans,” as she’d heard those around her say. Perhaps dinner, as seemed to be a popular choice. She would ask him. He would say yes.
But it was not Nick who greeted her that morning.
“Where is Nick?” she asked.
The man behind the counter did not smile. He barely looked at her at all. He focused instead on the line forming behind her, on worrying his hands with cups and a marker, and on plunking numbers into the register. “Accident,” he said. “Last night. What do you want?”
“I don’t understand,” the queen said, even as she felt her chest tighten, felt her stomach flip and her legs go weak and unsteady beneath her.
“Look, lady, I’m not here to answer your questions. Do you want coffee or not?”
“I’m fine,” she said. “No thank you.”
The queen turned, walked toward the door, and felt a tug on her shoulder.
“He talked about you last night,” said a small voice behind her. One of Nick’s compatriots, someone she’d seen often. “After you left. Said he was going to ask you out today.” The girl sniffled, wiped at a tear in her eye. “I just thought you should know,” she said, and choked on a sob. “I just can’t believe it.” And then she hurried to the back.
The queen walked out the door, into the daylight of a stark new reality.
“We told you this would end badly,” said her friend, again appearing from nowhere, hanging close by her side. “Human lives are fragile.”
And it was true that the queen did not understand death, not in the way that Nick would, that humans seemed to, and that she wished she could.
“I saw him yesterday,” she said. “He was just here.”
“Come home,” said her friend.
The queen could not, and did not, for a long, long time. She wandered dark paths, both within and without. She lived among the wild, lonely things, as she herself felt. Only when the pain dulled, when the weight of it began to left, did she return to her own kind and to her kingdom, though she was not the same queen. They say she was changed, perhaps forever.
“Are you happier, for having known him?” Her friend asked her this, one night, many years later.
“I am happy and sad, and lonely, and angry,” answered the queen. “I did not know I could feel so much.”
And they say she loves him still, the kindly king of coffee. They say her heart will never heal, will never be whole again, that some wounds will always remain open and aching. And that she watches, like a sentinel, from her favorite place upon the highest tower, far above that land of noise and motion and metal and coffee, for the day when her king, her Nick, will return to her once more.
************
Thank you for reading! This is the second of twelve stories I’ll write for my 2023 Short Story Challenge. The theme this year is: Wild.
I hope you join me and write some stories of your own this year! It’s fun, and I hope this will be a happy year full of good stories. But just reading is fine, too, and I’m glad you’re here.
The next story will be posted at the end of March.
It’ll be up tomorrow! It’s been a busy day choosing some finishing touches for our basement bathroom (which is still looking amazing and is so close to being done), and I feel like I need just a little more writing time. So, stop back by! This is going to be a fun one, I promise. 😊
And for now, enjoy this photo of a beautiful view from one of the local breweries here in my corner little of Virginia. We spent some time in the countryside yesterday and it was just lovely. If it’s going to be spring in winter, might as well enjoy it, right?
A Virginia Writer's Diary 