…Between them, Abner and Farley sum up Pale Horse – lean and tough, cruel and greedy. This place bonds people, whether they want it to or not. The summers are short, the winters are long. The strong look out for each other and the weak … Well, there are no weak left…
Such is the town of Pale Horse, the setting for my ghost story, published on the Horror Tree site as of yesterday.
Let those of you who don’t have the stomach for gore be assured – you’ll find nothing but creeping dread in Pale Horse.
And by the way, Horror Tree is a fantastic site for those of us who wade in dark shallows, full of interesting articles, fiction and writing opportunities. So do hop over and take a wander and read my story here.
I’ve been away from the blog a few weeks, finishing the first draft of my current WIP. Well, the draft’s done (81,000 words – hurray!) so I’ll hopefully be around here a bit… at least until it’s time to rewrite!
‘I saw her in the park . On days when men came round and I had to leave the flat. The lady would be under the trees, waiting for me.’
‘When else?’
‘At school before I was excluded. In the flat too.’
‘Was that when your mum was taking drugs?’
‘Yeah. We had a cupboard in the hall. When Mum came back from her dealer, the lady would be in the cupboard.’
‘How do you know she was there? Did you see her?’
‘I heard her. She had a way of breathing.’
‘Can you describe it? This way of breathing?’
‘No.’
‘Do you still see her?’
‘Only when I’m off my meds.’
‘Like last week?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Did you really forget to take your medication, like you told the police?’
‘No.’
‘Then why -‘
‘Because I missed her.’
***
Written for What Pegman Saw, the prompt that uses Google Street View as its starting point. This week we visit Providence, Rhode Island. See here to join in.
I’m away from my laptop this week so thought I’d share this, a story that won first place in a competition a few years ago. It’s a longer read than normal but worth it, I hope. As it was part of a Bronte anniversary comp. can any of you guess which of the sisters’ novels inspired it? Answers in the comments, please.
***
‘Got the look of an old lag about her,’ said Grandad, fingertip tapping the rain speckled pane.
‘Like you’d know,’ said Mum. ‘Come on, you’ve sagged again.’ She slipped her arms under his, yanking him up in his chair, plumping his jumper like she was arranging a cushion.
‘Leave me alone,’ he grumbled, swatting at her. ‘I’ve met crooks enough to know one. Come here, our John. Have a look.’ He tugged me close, pointing towards the street below.
From our sixth floor window, I could see the roof of The George Inn where Mum worked on weeknights and next to it the playground, with its crisscross paths and the frame with the missing swings.
‘What?’ I said, not sure what I was looking at.
Then I saw her, hunched against the wind, hair the colour of Tizer whipping from a squashy knitted hat. She pushed a tartan shopping trolley that flapped with empty carrier bags.
‘She’s wearing slippers,’ I said.
‘You see,’ said Grandad. ‘Probably pinched’em from Terry at the market.’
Mum had put on a rain hat and her coat, transforming the hat’s slithering ties into a bow with a twist of her fingers. ‘Her name’s Gracie, she comes in the pub. Downs three milk stouts every night then rolls home.’
Mum headed for the door. ‘The only criminal thing about her is the quarter of gin she hides in her trolley to sneak in her stout. Now Dad, stop talking codswallop. John, off to bed – and mind you brush your teeth.’
***
The next time I saw Gracie, I was sitting on a bench in the playground with Ed and Dougie from the flats. Ed had a bottle of Cream Soda and I’d brought two Penguin biscuits from home to share. Dougie didn’t bring anything – the cupboards in his place were always empty.
I was licking the last squishy chocolate from a Penguin wrapper, when Dougie said, ‘Seen her?’ Gracie was crossing the park with her trolley. ‘Nutter,’ he said and returned to peeling the label off the bottle.
‘Don’t do that,’ said Ed. ‘I want the money back on it.’ He nodded towards Gracie. ‘Mum says we should keep away from that old cow. Says noises come out of her flat at night.’
‘What kind of noises?’ I said.
Ed shrugged. ‘Weird ones. Mum says the old woman’s neighbour Mr Brocklehurst has complained to the council but they don’t give a monkey’s so long as the rent’s paid.’
‘Her trolley rattles like it’s full of empties,’ said Dougie. ‘And she smells like the drain outside the pub.’
‘Wonder what the noises are,’ I said.
Dougie snatched up the Cream Soda bottle and threw it hard. It fell just short of Gracie’s slippers, shattering into a million shards that skittered over the tarmac.
‘Bloody idiot,’ said Ed, punching Dougie hard on the leg. ‘You owe me the money on that.’
Gracie didn’t even pause, but trudged on towards The George.
***
We were walking back from school the next day when Ed raised the subject of Gracie again.
‘I went up to listen at the old bag’s flat last night.’
‘Why?’
‘Cos Mr Brocklehurst is above us and he was moaning and pacing and banging his stick on her wall – noisy pig. So I waited till my dad was watching the news and slipped out. Wanted to hear for myself.’
‘And?’ I said.
His pace slowed to a crawl. ‘Voices. Hers – and others too. Women mainly, but a man an’all – he was shouting. And there was a scraping noise – like chairs dragging across a floor.’
My pulse thudded in my throat. ‘My mum says she lives on her own.’
He nodded, eyes on the ground. ‘And she’s got no telly.’ We walked on in silence, sucking our liquorice sticks until they went soft.
As the shadow of the flats fell over us, Ed said, ‘I’m going back tonight. Coming?’
I stopped. ‘What?’
‘Don’t you want to know what the noises are?’
I was curious, but I hated walking round the flats in the dark. There were too many shadows.
‘Well, I’m going tonight. Coward.’ Ed banged through the double doors.
I paused just a second. ‘Ed! Wait up,’ I shouted.
***
Mum was working at the pub that night and I knew Grandad would be asleep in his armchair by half nine, so I found the torch, put it in my coat pocket and sneaked both into my bedroom. Grandad was snoring by quarter past nine and he didn’t stir as the front door clicked shut behind me.
The light was out on our landing and the weak glow from the torch only lit a small puddle at my feet. Cigarette packets, stubs, a baby’s dummy, all slid in and out of the puddle as I walked.
‘John!’
My heart beat in my ears, the torchlight quivered.
‘Over here.’
Ed stood in the shadow of a flight of stairs, coat over his pyjamas. A second figure stood beside him.
‘Alright, John.’ It was Dougie.
A click and another beam of light shone out, wavering upwards to settle on Ed’s face. ‘I told him what we were doing and he just turned up.’
‘Let’s go sort this old bird out then,’ said Dougie, heading for the lift.
I gave Ed a look but he just shrugged. ‘Yeah, I know. But what could I do?’
All I could think of was spikes of a shattered Cream Soda bottle.
‘Stinks of pee in here,’ said Dougie as the lift groaned and rattled.
A few seconds passed, there was a ping and the doors juddered open.
‘This way,’ said Ed, shining his torch along a row of blank doors.
At each flat I heard a muffled telly and dull voices. I was sure at any second someone would tell us off and send us home. But the wind tumbled empty crisp packets and whistled along the balconies – and no one came. At the end of the row, Ed stopped.
Shining his torch on a peeling door, he whispered, ‘Mr Brocklehurst’s.’ Then, the light slid sideways and we were there.
We listened, breathless.
A thump – loud and solid, like a body hitting the floor – followed by voices. A woman was singing – a tune that pulled at my insides. A man’s voice barked orders – the thwack of a stick. And weeping, the quiet kind of crying someone does when they don’t want other people to hear but can’t keep the tears in. Sadness filled me up, sitting behind my eyes till I felt like it would spill over.
‘What do you think?’ It was Ed, face pale, eyes big as golf balls.
For a second, I had been in the flat with the women, waiting for the stern man with the stick. ‘Is it the same as before?’ I whispered.
He nodded.
I tried to keep my fear pressed down, reminded myself we weren’t babies, that there would be good reason for the noises. But all I could think was one thing.
‘Ghosts?’ I whispered.
A fresh noise – the screech of unoiled metal, so sharp it pricked my eardrums like a needle. My heart beat against my ribs. I ached for the loo, for my bed and realised we hadn’t decided what we’d do when we reached Gracie’s door.
‘It’s open.’ Dougie stepped inside. Ed snatched at his sleeve, but grabbed only air.
‘What shall we do?’ said Ed. In the torchlight, he looked smaller than he did in the day.
There was nothing for it. I took a step, another and I was in.
Soon Ed followed on behind me, our torch beams overlapping, brightening the darkness so it was just light enough to see without bumping into things.
‘Don’t like the smell,’ said Ed.
It was like burning and wee that hadn’t been cleaned away.
‘Dougie!’ I called, but quietly, hoping I was loud enough for Dougie to hear and quiet enough for Gracie not to.
Thwack! The sound of a stick against railings. The pitter-pat of tiny paws.
‘Hell.’ Scampering from the torchlight, over a heap of rags and old newspapers, went one small tan body then another. ‘Mice,’ I breathed.
Crying again, from our right. I felt Ed’s arm brush mine and realised we’d huddled so close we almost tripped over each other as we walked, though neither of us pulled away. We followed the noise along the hall, towards a doorway glowing with dull orange light. The burnt smell grew stronger, catching at my throat.
‘Dougie?’ My heart tripped fast.
We turned into the room, into the sound of crying, the squeal of metal hurting my head. I stopped, unable to think what was happening.
The air was filled with smoke that stung my eyes and there was an armchair with a body slumped in it, another kneeling on the floor and the noise was so loud and the kneeling figure was Dougie and he looked up at us, his face shining and wet.
‘I think she’s dead,’ he said.
***
Someone had put blankets around our shoulders. Someone else had made us tea.
‘Don’t like tea,’ said Dougie and an ambulance man cuffed him round the head.
I heard the clack of Mum’s heels before I saw her. She stood apart, rain hat in her hand, nodding as a man in a uniform talked.
‘… old asylum nurse … lived onsite there for thirty years – turned her a bit odd I reckon. Didn’t like the quiet when she retired, so one of the staff made a recording – crying, the wardens, squeaking hinges – to help her sleep. Nowt so queer as folk, eh?’
Mum arms were crossed, face stern as the Queen’s on a stamp.
‘What were you thinking?’ she said.
I shrugged, too tired to explain and not sure I could. ‘Is she okay?’
Mum sighed. ‘She will be. Dropped a fag on the carpet – could’ve burned the whole of Thornfield House down. Come on. Let’s get you home.’
Ed raised a hand as I passed, Dougie too, his face smeared with drying tears and dirt. Both of them looked worried, as if they could still hear the women crying.
I’m away from my laptop this week, so I’ve scheduled this snippet. I’ll catch up with comments next weekend.Have a great week, all.
***
The dining room door was slightly ajar. That would be his mother, Elizabeth – she liked him to listen to the chatter, gauge the tone of the evening before his big entrance. The voices were hushed, barely raised above a whisper. One male voice – a bass drone – his mother’s choppy alto, then a twitter of sopranos he guessed were the spinster sisters, the unsuspecting guests of honour.
Beyond the door was Elizabeth’s world of candlelight and earnest conversation, the shy chink of wine glasses. Behind him was the entrance hall with its expanse of cracked floor tiles, the doors with their mottled brass plaques – billiard room, library, study – empty titles for unused spaces.
What his mother and the spinsters and the bass voiced man didn’t realise was that darkness was as full of colour and noise as daylight. If only they’d pay attention.
Somewhere upstairs a door thumped open and shut, caught in the draught from an open window. Goose bumps roughened his arms to shark skin. The dead were gathering around him, brushing against him, waiting for him to speak for them.
The grandfather clock struck, eight chimes that echoed in his chest.
“Matthew?”
It was time.
***
Bit of practice writing around characters from the current WIP.
Matt is a sixteen-year-old psychic, he and his mother Elizabeth make money from wealthy, bereaved clients. And Matt usually calls his mother by her first name.
The room was unassuming, the furnishings plain but clean, old but well kept, very much like the landlady, Mrs Hollis.
‘A month’s rent in advance,’ she said. ‘No lady visitors in the rooms, please. We’ve had unpleasant moments. In the past.’
My gaze lingered over the sloped ceiling, the low window that looked over a square of clipped lawn, gaudy sentries of begonias and geraniums.
I paused, feeling her watching me, enjoying her confidence shift into uncertainty.
‘Is everything to your satisfaction?’
‘Everything, Mrs Hollis? No, not everything. But the room? Yes.’
A little sigh escaped her and I felt glad I’d made her wait for my approval.
‘May I ask, is there a Mr Hollis?’
‘He passed.’ She shook her bowed head. Not a bad imitation of a grieving widow, though I’ve seen better.
I turned my attention to the shadow behind the door.
Mr Hollis, I presume.
***
Written for What Pegman Saw, the prompt that uses Google Street View as its inspiration. This week we visit Delaware.
I tried to be inspired by the location itself, read about Maryland and Delaware and this house – Great Oak Manor – that has been host to John F. Kennedy and Ernest Hemmingway in its time.
I’m afraid, though, my mind is too tied up with ghosts to shake them off and Mr Hollis jumped out at me at the last moment.
The shack had been the post office of a mining town, now deserted. Sunbleached boards across the windows, tiles missing from the roof like a reptile shedding scales.
‘This it?’ Roddy’s usual cocky smile had slipped as we’d driven further into the desert. Now he was a fifteen-year-old boy again, arms tight folded, fear skulking behind his eyes.
‘It’s okay, kid,’ I said, smiling. ‘Soon have a fire going. Go fetch the bedrolls from the pickup, would you?’
I scanned the plain, the distant ridge of smoke grey hills. At least we’d see someone coming. Any vehicle would kick up a dust trail and as long as we were vigilant –
Something cold brushed the back of my hand. Instinct made me look, but there was nothing. Of course not. You don’t see the Desert Kin. Not unless they want you to.
‘Roddy, I’ll take first watch,’ I called.
***
Written for What Pegman Saw, the prompt that uses Google Street View as its starting point. This week we visit Cloverdale, New Mexico. See here to join in.
‘Meet by the Green Wood,’ we’d say and share a smile.
A smile cos there was nothing green or wooded about that spot under the bridge on Greenwood.
The concrete was pitted, iron bars showing like bones through broken skin. We’d joke about bodies in the pillars, old gangsters and drug dealers who’d been holding up the road since the bridge was built in the sixties.
‘Putting something back into the community,’ Manny would say.
Con always laughed too hard at that, spluttering into his can of beer, making a show of wiping the spray from his face, his stone washed jeans.
But Con would always meet up with someone else on his way to the Green Wood, say he was passing Gerry’s anyway, running errands in Hop’s neighbourhood. Never would be there alone.
The place was always filled with voices, even when no one was speaking.
***
Written for What Pegman Saw, the prompt that uses Google Street View as a starting point. See here to join in.
Note
I confess, I clicked straight on the prompt image and wrote this story before reading Josh’s guidance about the horrifying events of 1921. I shall try to write another, more fitting, post.
In the beginning they were just an irritation, like lens flare or a scratched negative.
But he began to see them everywhere in his footage, among the Beng trees of Cambodia, in the dust and scrub of the Golan Heights, studying the murals on the Falls Road.
His hands would shake in the sick red glow of the darkroom as he reached for his magnifier, searching the prints before they dried.
Always the same blond and dark heads, close as if in conversation, the arms round each other, feet in step. Sometimes they were blurred, distant, part hidden behind a lamp post or car, but always the swept back hair, the holiday smiles.
His editor laughed, said they were his signature, better than a monogram. He smiled, nodded, all the while wondering how he’d learn who they were.
Then one dank night driving home on the coast road, he found out.
***
Written for What Pegman Saw, the prompt that uses Google Street View as its jumping off point. This week we are in Cardenas, Cuba.
My story is actually inspired by the Google Street View itself. You see, I kept seeing the same woman and child, in similar poses, arms round each other, presumably tagging along behind the camera operator. I just wondered what if they weren’t known by the photographer? What if their appearance was as much of a surprise to the person who took the images as it was to us?
On every window pane in every room we found two horizontal strips of black tape, the lower one always slightly wider than the one above.
After two days of packing up my late Aunt’s house, I had to know. ‘Mum, what do they mean?’
My mother trailed a finger over one dark line, muttering, ‘Eyes.’ She stroked the line below. ‘Mouth.’
The house fell silent, as if listening.
‘Mum?’ I breathed.
She tugged her cardigan around her, suddenly chilled. ‘Perhaps your aunt thought if they were blind and mute, they couldn’t hurt her again. Seems she was wrong.’
***
Written for Rochelle Wisoff-Field’s Friday Fictioneers. Just sneaked in under the wire for last week’s prompt, but if you’d like to join in there’ll be another picture tomorrow. See here to join the fun.
‘How long has she been missing?’ Papa pulled on his boots, his braces still hanging loose, bouncing at his thighs.
‘An hour ago.’ But I was reading up in the attic before that, hiding from my sister, avoiding the grief that hung about her like a shadow. I stared up the hill, towards the foot of the glacier. ‘She wouldn’t go up there alone.’
The old Nancy wouldn’t, but this hollow girl that had replaced her, who drifted like mist through the house since the accident … Maybe.
‘If I’m not back by nightfall …’ The door slammed behind Papa’s back.
***************************
Written for Rochelle Wisoff-Field’s Friday Fictioneers. See here to join in, read and comment.
What a happy place to be, back on Friday Fictioneers. And what a cracking, inspiring photo too. Thanks Russell.
Word Shamble 