A ghost story for Halloween
Oct 19, 2020 18:57:35 GMT 1
Grandmaster, AQUA JAR!™, and 1 more like this
Post by AQUA SALZ! on Oct 19, 2020 18:57:35 GMT 1
Hope you enjoy.
The Yellow Slicker
I am driving from the city back to Ipswich. It’s late. It’s cold. It’s raining. The fog, of course, is rolling in again. Damn it.
Seagulls are still off screeching somewhere. There has to be something wrong with birds that don’t go south for the winter. And seagulls especially, the nautical version of flying rats. And Is that just the reflection of the headlights?
It looks like a figure. Or maybe just a tree? No, a figure. A person. Not the headlights, a yellow raincoat. An old-fashioned raincoat—a slicker.
No one else driving up on this road in fall. I check my mirrors anyway and pull over.
Could I give her a lift? She would be greatly obliged—“greatly obliged”?—she ran out of gas and thought she’d be stuck here all night.
I don’t realize until she’s in my backseat that I didn’t see a car.
Not that that’s important.
We don’t chat much. That’s OK.
She does, however, tell me her address. It’s on my way.
We get there. I feel bad about dropping her off in the downpour, but she says she’s OK. She says thanks and goes in the house.
It takes me five minutes to realize she’s forgotten her yellow slicker in my car. I turn the car around, swerve in an attempt to avoid a tree in the goddam rain, and go back to the house.
I ring the bell.
The house looks older, somehow.
I am scared.
An old woman opens the door. She looks at me. She looks at the yellow slicker.
She says, “Go away, go away, by God, you. You brought me home 80 years ago, 80 years ago tonight. You tried to bring the raincoat back; you swerved and hit a tree. Stop. Stop doing it for the love of God. It wouldn’t fit me anyway. And I’d not accept a present from a man long dead.”
I stand there, on the doorstep, staring at the slicker in my hand. Then I return to my car, the raincoat and the house and the woman and the porch disappear, and
I am driving from the city back to Ipswich. It’s late. It’s cold. It’s raining. The fog, of course, is rolling in again. Damn it.
The Yellow Slicker
I am driving from the city back to Ipswich. It’s late. It’s cold. It’s raining. The fog, of course, is rolling in again. Damn it.
Seagulls are still off screeching somewhere. There has to be something wrong with birds that don’t go south for the winter. And seagulls especially, the nautical version of flying rats. And Is that just the reflection of the headlights?
It looks like a figure. Or maybe just a tree? No, a figure. A person. Not the headlights, a yellow raincoat. An old-fashioned raincoat—a slicker.
No one else driving up on this road in fall. I check my mirrors anyway and pull over.
Could I give her a lift? She would be greatly obliged—“greatly obliged”?—she ran out of gas and thought she’d be stuck here all night.
I don’t realize until she’s in my backseat that I didn’t see a car.
Not that that’s important.
We don’t chat much. That’s OK.
She does, however, tell me her address. It’s on my way.
We get there. I feel bad about dropping her off in the downpour, but she says she’s OK. She says thanks and goes in the house.
It takes me five minutes to realize she’s forgotten her yellow slicker in my car. I turn the car around, swerve in an attempt to avoid a tree in the goddam rain, and go back to the house.
I ring the bell.
The house looks older, somehow.
I am scared.
An old woman opens the door. She looks at me. She looks at the yellow slicker.
She says, “Go away, go away, by God, you. You brought me home 80 years ago, 80 years ago tonight. You tried to bring the raincoat back; you swerved and hit a tree. Stop. Stop doing it for the love of God. It wouldn’t fit me anyway. And I’d not accept a present from a man long dead.”
I stand there, on the doorstep, staring at the slicker in my hand. Then I return to my car, the raincoat and the house and the woman and the porch disappear, and
I am driving from the city back to Ipswich. It’s late. It’s cold. It’s raining. The fog, of course, is rolling in again. Damn it.