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October 10, 2004
'Everything happens on Halloween'
Something a little different to start today. Michele's continuing October theme of Halloween posts has inspired me to post in kind. This morning she is covering urband legends and ghost stories and has a challenge if anyone can tell her a story she hasn't heard yet. I haven't yet come up with one I've heard or read yet that I don't think she's heard, but I do write some of my own. Today I'll start with a story I wrote some Halloweens back. I'm working on a new story called "Last Chance" that I hope to have ready next week. Hope you enjoy this:
Julie looked with irritation at the lone customer wandering through the store. It was such a drag to have to work on Halloween and she had planned on closing up the store early to meet up with her friends.
Screw old lady Harrison, Julie thought as she glanced out the window, narrowing her eyes against the setting sun, I didn't want this job anyway. Let her stand here every evening with the smelly crap and the whacked out customers.
Julie's parents had been at wit's end trying to figure out where the sweet preteen of shining blonde hair and puppy-like eagerness had gone, to be replaced by a bored adolescent with dyed black hair, blood red lipstick and a nose-ring. Two high-powered criminal attorneys, her parents gave only fleeting consideration that their lifestyle of beach house, BMW's, hot and cold running maids, closets of barely worn clothes from Saks and Neiman Marcus and dinner conversations revolving around how most of their clients were guilty and how best to get them off, had anything to do with Julie's jaded outlook. No, they decided, she had to get serious and learn responsibility. Julie, who never in her life had even made her own bed, had to get a job.
Julie already was running with the Goth crowd at her high school when the parental edict came down. Many of her new friends, dressed in thrift store clothes paired with Doc Martens and twelve hundred dollar leather jackets were scandalized. Work? Meaningful looks were exchanged.
Ya gotta be kidding!
Julie promptly got a job at an occult store. And her nose pierced.
Julie sighed. Loudly. She hoped the woman fingering the crystals would take the hint. Tonight was supposed to be her night. Her friends were planning something special. Whisperings of a new Rave in town had passed with lightening speed through school and Julie was bound and determined to be there.
Julie had first liked working at the store. The primary reason was because her parents hated it. That thought always brought a smile to her face. But she had become intrigued with shop. There were books on spells, bins of dried flowers and herbs, exotic oils, crystals, magic sands and hand-dipped candles. Harrison had a reputation as an honest-to-god astrologer and many people came in just to have their horoscopes drawn up. But on Halloween the customers were downright weird. It was Julie's first Halloween working and she had started at the costumed freaks that came in requesting spell books and Tarot cards. By the end of the day, they only bored her and she was anxious just to close up and get away.
"Lady, is there anything I can help you with?" Julie didn't care that she was less than solicitous.
The lady moved from the crystals, a slight shaking of her head in acknowledgment of Julie's call. Julie noted she was dressed as a ghost, a flowing gown of layered white gauze, skin painted white, fingernails almost blue, long blonde hair that paled towards white. If Julie wasn't so agitated, she could almost admire the way the lady almost seemed to float across the room. Julie's mind automatically tagged her White Lady.
Man, she's really staying in character, Julie thought, realizing she couldn't even hear the lady's steps as she moved to the candles.
Julie watched as White Lady reached out and almost caressed the candles but didn't pick up a one.
"Uh, Lady, I don't want to be rude," shit, I sure wanna be if it will get you out of here! "I've got to close up soon."
"I thought you were open until eight?"
Julie groaned, "Look, have a heart. I do have plans tonight. After all, it is Halloween." She put what she hoped was a winning smile on her face.
"Halloween? Oh, yes, I now understand."
The voice was whisper soft and the words, spoken slowly, hung in the air. Julie was confused.
Who's b.s.ing who? She thought, You dress like that everyday?
Julie drummed her fingers impatiently on the counter, then moved behind it toward the cash register. She rang it open and lifted the cash tray to get the door key.
Screw it! I'm closing up , Julie wondered how fast she could push her car along the canyon road to get home and change. I'll be damned if White Lady is going to make me late.
A blast of cold brought her head up with a start, Oh, God, not another customer!
Julie glanced quickly around, spotting no one new, even as she realized she hadn't heard the sharp tinkling of the bell that bounced on a spring over the door. White Lady had left the candles and was moving toward her. Julie watched as she skirted a pool of sunlight.
Jesus, Mary and Joseph! She's barefoot! Julie could feel her mouth fall open.
"Yes, I remember Halloween. Everything happens on Halloween."
A smell like rotting leaves and grass clippings made Julie catch her breath. All thoughts about how she had first admired White Lady fled. As she got closer Julie could see the white dress was filthy. The shredded hem was caked with dirt and patches of gray and green crept up the skirt and sleeves.
"I was enjoying the day. I always end it here. Silly me. I always think it's going to last."
Julie barely heard her. She was focused on White Lady's feet. They were as filthy as the dress, the skin pale and cracked, toenails black. White Lady stopped just on the other side of the counter across from Julie. Julie's eyes traveled up to her face and Julie suddenly felt like a bucket of ice water had been dumped on her head.
Oh, God, oh, Lord, what was I thinking? Julie could feel her breath freeze in her throat.
The blonde hair was a mat, dry as summer desiccated weeds. There was no make-up, just white skin, dry and pulled taut as a drumhead. White Lady brought her hands up to rest on the counter, chalk claws, fingernails caked black with grime. Well, those fingers that actually had fingernails.
Julie was dimly aware of a high, discordant note. It was herself, crouched and keening in the childhood corner of her mind.
"It always happens, you see, my sweet," White Lady tried to smile, cracked lips pulling back over teeth the color of old ivory. Teeth abnormally long due to the shrinking, black gums. Something wet dropped from White Lady's mouth and landed on the counter. The same overwhelming compulsion that makes one look directly at a mangled car wreck pulled Julie's eyes down. Not really believing, she hoped it was only saliva.
But the mass was yellow, segmented and it squirmed.
Julie backed up against the shelves behind her and the sound of a bottle of oil toppling and shattering at her feet seemed far away.
"I get to come down from the canyon. But when the sun is gone, so shall I be. Back."
Julie noted that a patch of skin had come loose and hung from the side of White Lady's face exposing the jawbone, dull and gray. A liquid oozed black from the edges of that hole and dripped onto White Lady's shoulder. Something, some things, moved black and leggy just under the sheer top layer of her dress.
The keening in Julie's mind increased in volume, now a bleak winter wind howling under the eaves. The scent of the oil pooled at her feet rose as a wave to fill her nose, the heavy floral smell triggering thoughts of funeral sprays and mortuaries. Julie wanted to faint. Oh, God, she prayed to faint. To be enveloped in comforting blackness. But like a deer caught in the headlights of an onrushing truck, fear paralyzed her, staked her to the floor, unwilling witness of the inconceivable.
White Lady raised a hand and moved as if to stroke Julie's cheek, "Maybe this time you'll slow down. Maybe this time you'll stay until closing."
The truck hit Julie, realization sheering the last moorings of sanity. Her mind skittered and slid toward the precipice. Her mouth dropped open, giving full voice to the screams in her mind, the sound tearing at her throat. The noise unfreezing her, Julie scrambled for her keys.
Gotta get out. Gotta get out. Gotta get out. A mantra Julie desperately chanted, glancing about for escape routes, frantically trying to avoid White Lady.
"Stay, please!" the pleading tone made Julie look one last time.
What looked like tears coursed blood red down White Lady's face. The eyes were solid, dull silver. No expression in a dead face.
Julie edged around the counter and, skirting the nightmare apparition, pelted toward the door. She raced to the parking lot, toward her car, away from what was behind her. Away from the screeching, pleading tones. No thought but escape. Escape from White Lady. From that face.
The face that was her own.
Posted by Darleen at October 10, 2004 09:35 AM