When
Drew Walker was 23, his parents died in a car crash, leaving him their farm. Drew was 'different', and got teased a lot. He built strange scarecrows that moved when the wind blew. One would suddenly stand up in a field, one took off its
hat and scratched its head, and one made a courtly bow. There was one that
danced a mad jig in a high wind, and another that waved and whistled when the breeze was right.
Drew was getting letters and packages through the mail around then.
One
day Drew surprised us all by announcing he was
getting married. Drew would fetch his bride and throw a wedding
celebration in the spring. In May he left to collect her and was gone
several weeks. Details were sketchy, but that was normal for Drew. No one knew
how he found his bride and none of us got to meet her, for Drew brought her home in
the dead of night and she never came out of that house afterwards. She may
still be in there for all we know.
At
first Drew said his bride was tired from the journey. He seemed preoccupied, and became more and more
withdrawn. Eventually we rarely saw him. We gave up hopes of a wedding
celebration and eventually of ever seeing his wife. Rumours flew: she was ill, deformed, mute,
mad, or worse. Some said she was a store mannequin. You know how stories get
out of hand if no one is watching your back.
Kids
would sneak around Drew’s farm as a way to scare each other,
but they never saw anything. Drew installed locks, heavy curtains, and an iron
grate with a sliding cover on the door. The grate was open a crack so someone
could peek out without being seen if someone knocked on the door. Not that any visitors came.
It
got so we rarely saw Drew. He must have been shopping in another town. We forgot about him. Out of sight, out of
mind. One day we discovered his farm had been abandoned. We never found out what happened to Drew or his wife, if there was one. I wonder if things would be different if we had made an effort with that kid.
Challenge: Write a brief story about the above image and post in comments below.
"I dare you to go knock on the door of the Old Jensen place". Jeff sneered. I knew it was a mistake to play Truth or Dare with these guys. It was a double mistake to say "dare" at least with "truth" I could just tell a good lie.
ReplyDelete"What are you scared?" Kevin asked as his rubbed his eyes pretending to cry.
Of course I was scared. Everyone had heard of something strange going on there from time to time. Maybe it was mostly made up, but maybe it wasn't. But I was more scared of being thought a wuss, than I was of the door of the Old Jensen place.
"No" I yelled, trying, but failing from keeping my voice from cracking. Everyone laughed. I stood up and suddenly had what seemed like a brilliant idea, but turned out to be the worst idea of my life.
"I'm going right now to knock on the door, and if anyone is man enough, they'll race me there." I announced with as much bass and bravado in my voice as I could manage.
My idea worked. Five boys took off running to the Old Jensen place, with my lagging behind. The guys all ran through the gate at roughly the same time. I was winded put was running with all I had. I looked up just in time to see Jeff and Kevin join the others on the porch to wait for me. And then it happened.
The old wooden porch began to creek and then suddenly the wood started snapping and five boys began screaming and falling, but their screams were almost drowned out by the roaring of the porch caving in on itself and wooden planks, busted rails, and adolescent boy's bodies went tumbling into some abyss.
I stopped just short of what I assumed was a sink hole. I peered over the edge and couldn't see anything for the blackness of the hole. Then the porch door opened and a gaunt, hunched over, silver haired scarecrow looking man leaned out and asked, "Need a light, boy?"
I wanted to run away, but the man's, or maybe the creature's, gaze and dark, black eyes held me in thrall. My throat closed up and my mouth refused to open.
The thing, yes it wasn't a man, because it's hands were on fire and it's shirt was open and its chest, or what would have been a man's chest, looked the stuffing from an old couch, the thing threw a fireball down into pit.
Instinctively I followed the unholy torch's progress down with my eyes and saw all of my friends, or at least the kids I used to hang out with, impaled at the bottom of the hole on broken boards and pieces of rail that had been split in half. Kevin was still oozing blood around the rail that was now emerging form his chest. The fireball, with a mind of its own, circled the pit and I saw piles of bones and broken boards.
In that instant I broke free of my daze and sprinted away as fast I could to get help. The creature at the door cackling after me. I was just through the gate when I heard another monstrous roar, like the one that preceded the cave in, I glanced behind me and saw the porch coming back together, the pit disappearing underneath it. I fell over and expected to hear another cackle or maybe get singed by a fireball, but there was nothing except the sounds of wood coming back together. By the time I had regained my feet the porch looked the same as it ever had.
I ran home crying and vomiting. They never found my friends and I have never left the asylum my parents took me to. They just couldn't deal with my screaming, You see when I go to sleep the creature from the porch comes to talk to me, he says I never properly knocked on his door.
Love it, Jason!!
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