ANDI took Dyniszka to visit my mother for the weekend. I'm not sure what year, but I'd guess around 1987. Mom lived in Iowa. Dynishka and I came from San Francisco.
For years, I promised Dyniszka that one day I would take her hiking through my “haunted” neighborhood. This time she held me down.
We started by heading north on Mom Street, which meant we were going up a pretty steep hill. At the top of the hill we crossed to the opposite side of the road and then entered the yard.
It was quite murky. As I felt my way to the familiar paths of my childhood, we stepped over plant material that felt spongy, and I remember thinking that everything had changed since the last time I had made my rounds around the area. The yards in the elderly neighborhood are huge, with yards the size of football fields or larger.
We finally made it (entered, heh) to the back of said property and there we found a pretty little bridge crossing a miniature stream…then a tiny ride and we were on another path leading through another yard, then on to the street north of Mom's.
We headed west, past murky houses in huge yards… toward an S-shaped bend in the road. In the lower half of the “S” – towards the north – was a house with a totem pole.
Ah, the totem pole.
Let me tell you, it's weird. It does not stand upright, but is curved like a huge donut half buried in the ground. It seemed chilly to me, like ceramic or plaster, but now I guess it's a fiberglass composition. It was “decorated” (I employ that term loosely) with a number of curiosities; a huge ear (about a meter long), the face of a king from a deck of cards (not sure which one fits), a huge brain (maybe 5 times the size of a human brain), hmm… mushrooms, man, I can't remember it all! The thing looked like an acid trip realized in an incredibly strange sculpture. (I'll try to go there this summer and take photos, assuming it's still there.) We stayed for a tiny time. I was wary of a huge dog that I knew had been patrolling the property some time earlier. As creepy as it was, we didn't feel haunted yet.
We went to the church grounds. There we lay down in the parking lot to catch a glimpse of the expanse of stars above us.
Historically, in this parking lot I have always acquired “little guys” (if you will)… little people who then always followed me and my guest around for the rest of our exploration. (More stories another time?)
That night, although we thought we heard the unmistakable whispers and giggles of the “little ones,” something else seemed to permeate them. Not a sound, but a sense. Darkness… no, worse. It was malicious. Mean. Evil.
Dynishka and I sat up straight and instinctively began to slowly move so that we were sitting with our backs together.
The whispers and giggles of the “little ones” were muffled like birds and crickets before a storm. The silence was obvious and disturbing.
We walked over to where we heard the growl. Although let me explain, it wasn't so much a sound as a feeling. Makes sense?
We decided we should run… and I decided to cut through the Robinsons… a thickly wooded yard that opens onto a field that leads back to Mom's street.
The growl moved in front of us. Mind you, I didn't physically see anything, but the presence was unmistakable.
I gently touched Pumpkin's arm, nodding my head in the direction of our next move… but I kept my eyes on the spot my senses told me occupied *The Thing*.
Suddenly I darted towards the road, not even wasting time to cross the Robinsons… instead we went through the Kouski's yard… long like the other yards, but not as densely wooded. As we started towards the back… about 30 meters from the house in the side yard, *Something* tried to overtake us. By now it was making so much noise that I thought I was going crazy. I can't tell you these sounds now, I can't make my mind remember them. To tell you the truth, I wasn't at all sure whether the sounds were reaching only my head or beyond. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that the lights in the Kouski house were flickering and heads were looking at us through various windows.
Somehow, knowing that others could hear (or smell?) *Something* scared me even more. I ducked down to hide next to the trimmer truck (no truck) which was covered in elevated grass where the mower couldn't reach. Pumpkin fell to her knees next to me, panting. “What is this?” – she shouted in a whisper.
For a moment I didn't feel like *Something* was obstructing our path. I took the moment to pounce. I hate to say it, but I literally wanted to save myself… without even stopping for a millisecond to see if Dynishka survived!
I reached the gate separating the Kouski family's yard from the yard of the neighbor's mother across the street. I panicked and had a demanding time catching the latch when the *Thing* loudly made its presence known again. Finally the gate was open and we ran across the enormous lawn towards the driveway – a long and winding road. The formal garden surrounding the house is separated from the front by a long line of trees that runs parallel to the creek (mentioned earlier in my story). As we approached the aforementioned line of trees running so swift that not a single step touched the ground, we woke up to what sounded like hundreds of sleeping birds that immediately fled from under the trees, screaming and making a terrible noise.
Cacophonous.
After that, I wasn't sure if I heard birds, or something chasing us, or both. I should mention here… beyond the extreme fear, there seemed to be something strange happening in time and space. I can't explain or describe it, everything seemed twisted and unreal. Perhaps it was simply terror.
We finally emerged from the trees and made our way to the front fence/gate (an impressive black iron gothic structure that was locked, argh!) we didn't break stride until we came across a gate and had to climb through it. I felt like the men from “The Omen” who were running away from evil dogs in the cemetery and I had a terrible thought that I would break through!
I managed not to do that. We ran across the street toward the heated glow of the lights on the sidewalk in front of my mother's house, and then we heard the comforting sound of my dog Benjy barking in the yard.
We ran up the driveway and out the back gate to collapse on the loungers… panting and laughing, almost crying and trying to get the words out.
Once we had gathered our thoughts (translate as shit) and were finally able to talk, we sat down and in hushed voices we told each other about what each other felt and saw, etc. When we did this, we heard my horses in the pasture behind my mother's house come to the fence [which kept them out of the backyard proper]. My dog ran up the stone path to greet them and we followed. Eventually we stood by the fence, petting and cooing to the animals. In front of me was Zeus, our greatest stallion.
Now, in hindsight, I remember he was acting strange (everyone was acting strange). Saucy. But then I guess I tried to make everything as normal as possible and shook it off.
After a while, Zeus took a step back, which was an awkward move because he only did it with one leg. Then he looked straight at me (into my eyes? I don't know, too murky) and started urinating (?!), long and drawn out pee. His posture was, I would say, almost menacing, as if he were a bull preparing to charge!
As Dynishka and I (and penniless Benjy) witnessed all this, the *Thing* fell on us from above. There were no trees directly above them, just an “old-fashioned” power line. He fell to the ground directly between Zeus and me, but on *my* side of the fence. When I say it fell, I mean we heard it…we felt the sound reverberate in the ground at our feet (we were all standing very close…within 3-4 feet).
Let me remind you again that I didn't physically see anything, but my brain… was trying to create mass in the general vicinity of the *Thing*… I still, seriously, don't remember physically seeing anything.
Anyway, the horses, including Zeus, burst into wild neighing, bucking, and kicking, and then ran away as if they were being chased by wolves.
Completely speechless, I looked at Dyniszka, searching for any reasoning in my mind. Benjy snapped me out of my thoughts (though I doubt it lasted more than a few seconds). Benjy barked and ran home. We followed him again.
The flight was exhausting.
For a moment I couldn't see the house or the back porch, our supposed safety. Instead, I saw myself running from behind in panic, as if I was seeing it with my eyes.
We reached the porch and Benjy was already inside, using his own dog passage through the back door. I was tempted to jump over it myself, but my superior logic convinced me to employ the doorknob instead. Dynishka and I didn't stop until we ran to the front of the house… into the front and formal living room (only used when Mom has guests). When we got there, we were strangely tranquil. Harvested. Moving significantly.
I went to the secretary in the corner and took out a pen and paper. Dynishka turned on the stereo and took a bottle of Merlot from the wine cabinet. I sat on the sofa with a pen in my hand and intended to write down our experiences. Dynishka sat on the floor next to the coffee table and poured us both a glass of wine. Even though we were out of breath, we didn't want to show it. We were fine. One by one, my cats began to enter the room, noticing that we were out of character, but they didn't want us to think they cared enough to show any concern.
Just when everything was starting to get better, a huge fight broke out under the couch I was sitting on. I mean, you could see fur flying out from underneath, and of course you know how terrible that sound is! There was no doubt in my mind (at least at the time) that my cats were fighting *Something* right under my galley!
Now this is where the story ends. I know that Dynishka and I took that bottle of wine to my bedroom, where we sat with every lithe on (including the closet lithe). We didn't talk about the incident again that evening. We just waited for the sun and luckily the wait was peaceful.
I finally finished writing the entire story (by hand, about 20 pages front and back). I stuck to it for many *many* years as well. Although now since I bought the house in August '98… I can't locate the sheets, alas, I tried my best in this story.
