Fiction

When I back into the driveway dust flies up and I grimace as the underside of my car scrapes on a mound of dirt. Mom’s old black jeep was suited for this, but my new silver car, which I bought with my first paycheck after the raise, is used to city life. I walk up the green steps, pull open the screen door, and step into the empty mud room. As soon as I enter my breath catches and I reach for the doorframe to steady myself. It’s not just the lack of old cookbooks and Martha’s old rocking horse, though that’s striking, what throws me is the utter lack of life that made this house what is was, made my childhood what it was. There’s no laughter that echoes through the hallways, no one to interrupt my journey with a call of my name. Instead I’m left alone to stroll around the edges of the room until I reach my corner. It was always filled with shoes, lined up and organized. Martha’s shoes, on the other hand, were never organized. She would toss them off as she rushed inside, probably after her curfew. She never untied her sneakers either, just shoved them on as she rushed out the door, probably late for something. People made fun of her for her constant movement and incessant tardiness but at least she had places to be. They made fun of me for the hours I spent in the backyard poring over my fantasy novels and the careful moments I spent arranging each shoe by color or by type depending on my mood. Now I slip off my loafers, taking a moment to line them neatly so they make a ninety-degree angle with the wall, a practice of mine ever since Ms. Jasetti taught us right angles in the third grade. They look strange, too professional and too grown-up to be here. But that’s life, dress shoes replace sneakers.

Nostalgia crowds this house like dust but it’s not until the kitchen that it slams me in the chest. The stove is off, pans are sitting in boxes on the counter, even the smell is fading. In my mind that smell is always the same, fresh bread and chicken soup and my mother’s perfume. But in reality it was always changing, a reflection of what was for dinner that week and which family members had helped cook on Friday night.

I leave that room as quickly as I can and find myself in the dining room. Great- Aunt Esther’s mahogany table is gone, along with the sideboard that got picked up at a tag sale. The radiator looks strange without the other furniture and the omnipresent flowers. When I close my eyes I can see the blue vase filled with pansies but they’re wilting. For a moment I am shocked because Mom would never let the flowers wilt. Then I remember why I am standing here, then I remember that the flowers aren’t even there anymore, Martha must have taken them. I’m glad she did, I would have given them fresh water and left them for the next family. That’s what Mom would’ve wanted me to do.

My room is right at the top of the stairs on the left. It got sealed off after I went to college and it always made me uncomfortable when I came back to visit. The layer of dust made me feel old and out of place, so I would dump my stuff and go downstairs- to people who made me feel young and right. Now the old bed, desk, lamp, are gone. The green paint I picked out at seven is still there though, I wonder if it will still be here in another twenty-five years or if the new owners will paint over it.

When I place my hand on the wall I can feel my heartbeat pound back at me like a recording. I open the closet and see my teenage years locked away, the worst parts stuffed in corners. I am tempted to root around. Re-read Tolkien and re-watch Bill Hienk beating me up in front of the multiplex. Instead I slam the door then lean against it. Breathe in, breathe out, some things are better left alone. I head back down the hallway.

The hospice bed is still in Mom’s room. Martha wants it out but when she called Jones’s Hospice Supplies all she got were automated tellers who tried to explain how to raise and lower the seat. Martha hadn’t wanted her to come home, if it were up to Martha she would still be on life support at St. George’s Hospital. If it were up to Martha she would still be alive. I think Martha blames me sometimes for her not being here. I know Martha blames me sometimes for her not being here. I won’t try to tell her how much I wish she were still alive too. I won’t try to tell her how much I blame myself too. But I know this is what she would have wanted. She wasn’t the kind of person who would’ve wanted to be kept alive by machines. She wasn’t even the kind of person who would’ve wanted to sleep in a moving bed.

The bed is the only thing left in the room except for the hatbox. I’ve never seen inside the box. I didn’t even know the box existed for years. I’m not sure how much she looked at it, or how much she thought about my dad. The box is still here because no one wanted to take it. No one even wanted to look inside it. I could look inside it now, I wouldn’t even have to tell anyone. But I honored what she would’ve wanted to the point that it caused her death, I will honor it now.

I pick up the box, bring it downstairs, out to my car. It goes under the seat, the keys go in the ignition and I pull out of the driveway.

I’ll probably never go back to that house. Martha say’s it’s going on the market as soon as that bed is gone. Martha’s the one who’s taken over the project. She’s the one who talked to the realtor. I just showed up, signed some papers, and took the box no one wanted. Just like always Martha is the one with the plan, with the drive; that’s okay I have a well-paying job and some spare time.

I make it halfway down the highway before the road begins to blur. I pull over at the McDonald’s, the same branch Mom used to take us to when work was bad. I loved those days because she gave me the money, finally an acknowledgment that I was the older one, the more responsible one. For a moment I could lead Martha by the hand and feel like an adult while she made both of our Happy Meal toys run in circles. Of course she was the one who stood up and pulled me out of the linoleum booth and back to the car. Of course Martha always won the power struggle in the end. If she was here right now she would be the one taking charge, telling me whatever I’m doing isn’t healthy. I almost wish she was here to make me get a salad and go home but she’s somewhere outside of Boston with her numbers-minded husband and their kids who think I’m vaguely interesting.

I think about Martha and her nice suburban home for a long time. I wonder if she is happy with her life, I wonder if my mom was happy with her life. I wonder if I should try harder to be happy with mine or if I should leave well enough alone and settle for content. I sit in silence for a long time watching commuters and tired families rush in and out of the restaurant until the tears start to fall. I’ll miss that house, it holds the last vestiges of my childhood. But the tears are for my mom.

Ellanora Lerner is an eighth grader who loves books and feminism and poetic things like sunsets.She hopes to write a novel that is both chillingly dark as well as enjoyable and direct a gender swapped Broadway revival. She has been previously published in Stone Soup and Teen Ink and her work can be found at: sometimesithinkimpoetic.tumblr.com

The sound starts off quietly, and I barely even hear it, a gentle swish swish. David stirs next to me, and I slap his arm, mumbling at him to shut up. He continues to steal the covers and swats at me halfheartedly, barely awake.

Another swish swish a few minutes later, followed by a sound similar to nails against a wall.

“David shut up…” I say again, burying my head in my pillow. “For God’s sake.”

“I’m not making any noise,” he whines.

“Your nails are clacking against the headboard,” I say.

He mumbles something under his breath, but buries his hands under the covers nevertheless.

Eeeeeeeek.

Okay, that definitely wasn’t David.

Eeeeeeek. Swish swish.

“Nat, you’re doing it now,” David says, shaking my shoulder.

“No, I’m not.” I turn the lamp on. “There’s something else making that noise.”

David moves to lean on his elbow, eyes looking still blurry from sleep, but he takes my hand. “It’s probably just the house. It’s old.”

Eeeeeeeeeek. Swish swish swish swish.

I look over at him, eyes wide. “Houses do not make that noise.”

He starts to look a little worried. “Uhh, maybe it was wind.”

“David this is how every single cheesy horror story starts out. ‘Oh it was just the wind.’ Next thing we know, we’re dead,” I say.

“Nat—”

“I’m serious.”

“Well, what do you think it is?” he asks, skeptically.

Swish swish swish. Eeeeeeeeeeeek.

I pull the covers up over my face. “Oh no. It’s a ghost.”

“What?”

“It’s a ghost!” I stage whisper. “What else swishes into the night?”

David rolls his eyes. “Ghosts don’t make noise.”

“How do you know that? You ever seen a ghost before?” I glare at him.

“That doesn’t even matter because they’re not real,” he says.

I freeze. “Not real? Not real? You have got to be kidding me…”

“Ghosts do not exist. And to prove it to you, I’m gonna go downstairs right now.”

David moves to get out of the bed, but I pounce on him before he has a chance. “You are not going anywhere!”

“Yes I am!”

“No you’re not! How are you going to survive all by yourself?”

He stops struggling from me for a moment. “What?”

“We don’t know how many of them are down there. And even if there is only one… you’re not exactly the most likely to get out unscathed.”

“Unscathed?”

“I hope you know that if I wasn’t here right now, you’d be dead.”

“Natasha, I swear to God—”

“Please please please don’t go down there. I’ll never forgive you.”

He sighs. “Fine. Fine, I won’t. But know I’m not doing this for you, I’m doing this for me.”

“How are you doing this for you?”

“I really don’t feel like getting up anymore.”

Swish swish swish. Eeeeeeeeeeeeeek. Swish.

“Is the door locked? Oh no, we’re gonna die,” I say.

I’m still clutching to him, and he rolls his eyes, but pats my back reassuringly. “There, there.”

“Shut up. You think this is a joke.”

David squints at me, suspiciously. “Is it a joke?”

“No,” I say.

“Why are you even afraid of ghosts?” David asks. “I mean, if they’re invisible, how can they even hurt you?”

I swallow hard. “They can move things without touching them. They can pass through walls. They can create wind and set things on fire.”

“Why?”

“Because ghosts are vengeful, that’s why.”

“Do you know anyone who’s dead who’d want to kill you?” he asks, thoughtfully.

“Not that I can remember,” I say. “What about you?”

David shrugs. “No one dead, anyway.”

“Dang it.”

“Perhaps this ghost just simply forgot to bring something with him into the afterlife and is asking if he can have it back in the nicest way possible,” he says.

Swish swish. Eeeeeeeeeeeeek.

I scoff. “Yeah right. I bet they’ve got everything in the afterlife.”

“Maybe they forgot their diary. That’s something you would do,” David suggests.

“This is your fault anyway,” I say.

“My fault?”

“Yes. I told you this land might be haunted.”

“Are you actually joking right now?”

Swish swish. Eeeeeeeeeeeek. Swish.

“No, I’m not,” I say. “We’re going to die and it’s all because you wanted this house.”

“You wanted this house too!”

“Yeah, but I would’ve been fine in another one. You were pretty set on this, weren’t you?”

“Just because the people who lived here before us died, doesn’t mean that it’s haunted ground.”

“Just listen to yourself! They died here!”

“That’s generally what people do, Nat!”

I groan. “This is ridiculous.”

“You’re the one who thinks there’s a ghost in the house,” he says.

“I’m being reasonable…”

“Generally, I don’t think reasonable people believe in ghosts.”

“You’re just saying that because you only hang out with reasonable people.”

“We have the same friends.”

“That’s beside the point.”

“Don’t you think that if there was a vengeful ghost, then we would’ve already been dead?”

I listen for the noise, but it doesn’t come back. David, looking very pleased with himself, tells me to please turn the lamp off so he can get at least a few hours of sleep, and promptly turns around, burying his body back underneath of the covers. I don’t fall asleep, and I don’t go downstairs the next morning until David wakes up. It’s not the last time we hear the noise, but David buys me earplugs, so it works out okay in the end. For a ghost haunting, anyway.

Rachel Husk is twenty years old, and  goes to Bowling Green State University. She is  majoring in Creative Writing and minoring in Women’s Studies.

She was so focused.

Sapphire eyes stuck to the marble notebook like they were meant to be. Every time she looked back up at the white board, I’d stare at the graphite doodles dancing across my beige desk. One was of King Kong, except he wasn’t rampaging on the Empire State Building; he instead had an apparent affection towards the Eiffel Tower and very, very large berets. I don’t think there was anyone who wouldn’t want to see a mutant, French-gorilla movie.

My fingers gripped my pencil lightly, turning and twisting it between the blue grids of my paper. Today, it was going to be French King Kong vs. British Godzilla. A cup of tea in his talons and Union Jack scales would do the job.

She looked back down.

Okay, I wasn’t really sure when she was looking at the board or not. I had to look out of the corner of my eye so I wouldn’t come off as creepy, even though I probably was. Our legs were touching so slightly it shouldn’t even have been noticeable to anyone sane. But of course, to me, it was the biggest deal in the universe. My thigh was as stiff as a branch, and every breath I released shuddered as it slipped past my lips.

She looked back up.

My head ducked so quickly my forehead almost slammed into the tabletop. I could barely register the incoherent babbling my teacher was letting loose. It had something to do with numbers, I was pretty sure. My No.2 twirled in my fingers and I fed Godzilla some fish n’ chips.

“Andy,” a voice boomed ahead.

I almost didn’t look. If I did, she would notice me for sure. This wasn’t a good first impression.

Figuring that acting like even more of an idiot wouldn’t help me whatsoever, I looked up. “Yes, Ms. Birch?”

My teacher balanced her frail weight on the board sill. “I may be old, but I’m not blind.”

“What do you mean?”

She rolled her eyes. “Just pay attention and actually write down some math once-in-a-while.”

And with that, her back returned to my view and class resumed. A couple of curious eyes lingered on me for a few seconds, but everyone gets bored eventually – I was the epitome of that principle. And King Kong was begging for a croissant-club.

By the time the clock struck two and metallic ringing echoed throughout the humdrum halls, I had a whole sci-fi, action-packed, romance-induced movie scene planned out. I wouldn’t have hesitated to get out of my seat in any other class, but I had to make sure she left first. Any eye contact and I would probably melt in my Converse. I crumpled the paper in my palms like playdough and made my way towards the door. Stray beams of buttery, spring sunlight had managed to infiltrate the gray barriers of this prison, lighting the room with an uplifting-but-solemn aura. My hand swiftly tossed the international-monster extravaganza into the cerulean recycling bin.

“Don’t forget about the other one.” Ms. Birch eyed me from her chair.

I gave her my signature, clueless expression. She sighed, extending her finger towards the desks – her desk. My eyes locked onto the egg-white sheet slumbering on the table next to mine while my feet quickly shuffled towards the mysterious object. The paper shivered between my fingers.

It was everything mine wasn’t.

The silver bricks and cream mortar of the walls were sketched so perfectly I had thought it was a photograph. Sunlight was obtusely shaded with motley hues of gray. Even the pencils were silhouetted against deft shadows with sharp strokes of graphite. Everything was so detailed and realistic – on point. But I paused when I spotted the bottom-left edge, and began to crease the corner of the sheet.

Hunched over and intricately shadowed was my lanky self, a sly, shadowy pupil staring at me from the corner of its eyes.

Ujwal is a junior at Montgomery Township High School in Skillman, New Jersey, where he is the president of the Planetary Conservation Club. When his fingers aren’t thundering upon a keyboard or suffocating a ballpoint, Ujwal loves to watch movies a little too late at night and loop his Spotify. He aspires to attend film school and manifest his stories on screens big enough for the world to see…with a nice, generous bucket of popcorn, of course.

I pride myself on being an observer. The beautiful things in this world, natural and man-made, have never ceased to amaze me. I love watching winter transform into spring, seeing a train pull into the station, smelling chocolate chip cookies fresh out of the oven, and listening to the dialogue of two sparrows at the crack of dawn. I love it all, but I enjoy observing people the most.

On this particular day, I was sitting at the back of a near empty bus traveling from Otega Bay, a seaside tourist hub, to Trayton, a rural town on the other side of the mountains. The bus had just made its last stop on the edge of town and it was now making its way towards the mountain road. On a normal day, this trip would take an hour and seven minutes, but it was raining and the bus was expected to arrive later than usual.

I watched as water droplets ran down the window to my right. Some of them fell straight and fast while others took their time, sometimes getting swept up in another droplet’s path to the bottom. Looking past the rain, I could see the road start to slope upwards and the roar of the bus’s engine signaled the start of its climb up the mountain.

This trip was the last run of the day and there would be no other bus until the next morning. The bus driver was tired and ready to end his ten-hour shift. He was looking forward to spending his weekend off with his wife and watching the fifth season of Mad Men, one of their favorite shows. Since it was raining, his wife would expect him a little later than usual and have a nice cup of tea waiting for him upon his return. Though it would be eleven o’clock and well past dinnertime, a warm meal would be placed on the dining room table, because his wife insisted that he eat a proper meal, not one from a paper bag. The bus driver was especially excited for tonight because he had finally saved up enough money for he and his wife to go to Hawaii and was planning on surprising her with the plane tickets over dinner.

This bus trip was not popular by any means and functioned primarily as a commuter route for the residents of Trayton. However, on this trip, a tourist couple sat two rows back from the bus driver and their six-year-old daughter lay sleeping across their laps. After much disagreement, they had elected to stay with relatives in Trayton rather than pay for a costly hotel in Otega Bay. The woman insisted that the long bus ride was a small price to pay for saving a hundred dollars a night and the man soon gave in.

The woman didn’t want to stay with her relatives either, but she realized too late that she had underestimated the cost of the trip and they could not afford to stay in a hotel for the next week and a half. She knew that if her husband found out, he would want to end the trip early and she would have to tell their daughter that she couldn’t see the dolphin show that she had very much been looking forward to. The woman planned on telling her husband about their financial trouble after the trip was over and then working longer hours so they didn’t have to worry about the money that they had overspent.

The man might have noticed their savings slowly disappearing had he thought to check, but he had other worries on his mind. He had been fired two days before the start of their trip, but by then, the trip was already planned and paid for. He knew that his wife needed a break from work because her accounting firm had just finished a busy season and she was exhausted. If she found out he had been fired, the man knew she would cancel the trip and insist that she work even more. He also didn’t want to disappoint his daughter who had been looking forward to seeing the dolphins for weeks. When planning the trip, his wife assured him that they had saved up enough money and he decided that they would be fine until he could find a new job. He resolved to tell his wife that he’d been fired after their vacation, and had already lined up several interviews for when he returned home. For now, he just wanted the three of them to enjoy their family vacation.

The bus was nearing the top of the mountain and the rain had started to pick up. The bus’s headlights forged a path through the shadows that clung to the rock wall and the mountain’s inhabitants vanished into small crevices to avoid the bright light. I found myself thinking that I might like to follow them and explore the mountain, but the thought was fleeting and vanished altogether as the bus rounded the corner.

There was a person, a woman, sitting at the middle most row on the left side of the bus. She had been there since long before I arrived and was a mystery to me. She sat quietly, gripping onto the backpack in her lap, and stared out the window into the rain. I did not know where she came from, why she was here, or what business she had in Trayton which was unusual for me, but I wasn’t one to give up easily. I managed to gather, from the pins on her backpack, that she loved marine animals and, from the faint song fragments coming from her earphones, she loved listening to classic rock.

It wasn’t much, but I was content with knowing that and turned my attention out the window. We had reached the top of the mountain and a view of the town of Trayton was barely visible through the rain. Lights from the town shone through the darkness in place of the moon and the stars which, on this night, were covered by the storm clouds. Most of the residents had gone to bed, and the few that hadn’t were either on this bus to Trayton or waiting upon their return.

At the last stop before the mountain, a lone man got on the bus. He had a tough appearance complete with an unkempt beard and weathered clothes. These features caused most of the passengers to shy away from him in discomfort. Noticing their gazes, the man had chosen to sit towards the back of the bus as to not disturb the others. It was amusing to me, their weariness of this sailor, because out of all those on the bus, he was perhaps the most kindhearted.

The sailor had been traveling up and down the coast of Peru with his shipmates bringing aid to civilians after a devastating earthquake. His disheveled appearance was a result of a mild storm he and the rest of the crew ran into on their way back up the coast. He had battled the storm all through the night and was looking forward to reuniting with his wife and son after three weeks of separation. After a good, long sleep, he was planning on taking them camping at a little cove in the mountains. There, the sailor would point out the different types of trees and, just like every time they had gone before, he would listen to his wife tell them about the different species of birds, and watch as his son attempted to catch squirrels that got too close.

The bus driver, who had paid special attention to the sailor to make sure he paid his bus fare, would never know that the sailor also loved watching Mad Men with his wife or that he too understood the allure of a warm meal waiting at home. The couple, who shifted in their seats as he passed, would never exchange pleasantries with this man, or ask about his family waiting at home. They would never consider that this man could understand the selflessness behind the secrets they kept from one another, or know that he had a child the same age as the little girl who lay sleeping in their laps.

The bus started its descent and I turned my attention to the pine trees whose tops barely reached the edge of the road before dropping off down the side of the mountain. The rain was almost blinding and the once tiny droplets were now buckets of water pounding the side of the bus. The rain weighed on the branches of the pine trees, dragging them down, and the wind, which was starting to pick up, made even the strongest of trees sway. The bus’s metal walls had previously hidden the wind’s presence, but now the windows shook and the roar of the bus’s engine was lost in nature’s fury. It would be a stormy night in Trayton, but even then it was beautiful.

Otega Bay, where I had just left, was full of hazards, crime, and drunken mistakes. Though I visited often, I knew I would not like to live there. Maybe I was biased. I often visited larger, more chaotic cities, so maybe I relished the peaceful, isolating nature of towns like Trayton where nothing ever happened that would make headlines. Or maybe these small towns really were more beautiful. They always seemed more peaceful and inviting. Their sky always looked clearer, their birds more cheerful, and the people less burdened. Maybe one day I’d have to stick around and find out, but as for tonight, I had work to do.

The storm had by now turned violent with claps of thunder and streaks of lightning. The little girl had awoken with a cry and now sat wailing on her mother’s lap. Her father stroked her hair softly, whispering words of reassurance in her ear. The mysterious woman clutched her backpack tighter and was now looking at the road ahead. Maybe she often got car sick, or perhaps she wasn’t used to taking bus rides, especially in such conditions. I couldn’t tell. The sailor seemed the most at ease. He had been through many storms on open water and the events outside didn’t seem to faze him. Instead, he looked towards the couple comforting their daughter until he caught the attention of the little girl. The girl stared back at the sailor, rubbing her left eye with her fist. The sailor grinned, making silly gestures with his eyebrows, until the girl laughed and smiled back. The girl’s father looked back at the sailor and nodded his thanks before turning back to his family.

The bus driver had done his best to stay vigilant, but the ten-hour shift, combined with his restless sleep the previous night, slowed his reflexes. Lightning cracked above them on the cliff, illuminating the night sky for a fraction of a second. In the next instant, a large tree, with burn scars across its trunk, dented the road fifty feet in front of the bus. The driver slammed on the brakes, but the road, wet from the rain, refused to grip the tires. The bus slammed into the tree and was forcefully turned towards the guardrail. The little girl was crying again and suddenly, we were airborne. The family’s suitcases flew down the aisle towards the back of the bus where I was sitting and hit the wall to my right. The mysterious woman and the sailor gripped the seats in front of them, but slowly, they began to rise up off their seats. The bus driver was knocked out cold from the impact with the tree and would not wake.

After the bus hit the ground, it was about twenty seconds before it stopped rolling. By the time the bus had reached the bottom of the mountain, it had been completely destroyed. The windows were shattered, the right side was dented in, and the passengers lay scattered across its interior. I got up from the floor, though technically I was standing on the roof now. I walked over to the little girl and tapped her shoulder. She stirred and looked up at me.

“Who…who are you? I didn’t see you on the bus.”

“I’m sorry, the bus crashed. Come with me,” I replied and held out my hand. She hesitated, but finally placed her hand on mine and I pulled her to her feet. I said, “Let’s go get the others,” and began walking towards the front of the bus. The same thing happened each time I approached the others. They’d ask, “who are you?” and, “what happened?” and I’d tell them, then reach for their hand.

The bus, twenty-three minutes from town, would never arrive. The little girl would never get to see the dolphin show. Her parents would never know each other’s secrets, nor care to remember their own. The warm meal waiting for the bus driver’s return would eventually grow cold. The sailor had, unbeknownst to him, already visited his family’s camping site for the last time four months earlier. And despite it all, each of them would take my hand smiling.

That’s the strange, beautiful thing about death. Everyone, when their time comes, accepts it. They grab my hand and only a few ever look back upon themselves. If they do, it is only for a moment.

As I was leading the group of people away from the bus, slight movement to my right caught my eye. The mysterious woman was lying outside the bus and stirred as if waking from a troubled sleep. It all made sense to me now. I was not meant to know her story, at least not yet. Sometime in the near future, I would return to Trayton and see the mysterious woman again. On that day, her story would become clear to me, but not before.

I turned back to my companions. For today, my duty was to them. In life, people never stop and notice the little things. In death, I’d like to think they start to understand the beauty I see in the world, and I always take a little time to show them. I show them the beauty of the howling wind, the chilling rain, and the flickering lights of town from up above. I show them, then I move on, to another town, another group of people, and a new, beautiful day.

Katie Sarrels is a freshman at California State University Long Beach where she majors in both Film and English. She hopes to work as a producer for a major TV show, but her biggest dream is to one day write an original crime novel.