I've Come for My Girl and Two Other Dark Tales Read online

  She shook her head and then replied, “This thing here is older than Jesus, and has walked the land long before anyone even wrote the Bible. This being doesn’t feel love or hate, and there’s no mercy in its bosom. There’s no bargain it's willing to make because it wants, what it wants. Indigenous tribes stayed away from pieces of land soaked in blood, where men cried out in agony as death came to claim them. They feared this spirit would soon stalk among the dead. People of other places and civilizations have given it different names through the ages. Some invoke it by one of its secret names, looking for power or revenge. They think they have control, but they learn the truth of its nature when it’s too late.”

  I thought of yesterday morning when my only worry was missing my friend. I was no longer the same person from the day before, my sense of ordinary had been ripped from me and my innocence had gone with it.

  In a voice devoid of emotion I said, “I don’t know what to give.”

  Her eyes were full of pity and then her eyes slid to my hands. I started crying, “My hand? It wants my hand?”

  She grabbed me by the arm and shushed me. “Not your hand, but if you wait long enough, this creature would want that, and more.”

  “More?” I repeated.

  “Yes, a finger…” I didn’t let her finish and started bawling again. Hysteria rose in me.

  Jessi grabbed me by my shoulders and said, “Shut up, she’s trying to tell you something!”

  “Not your whole finger, just the tip. I bet we can get away taking no bone, but you must tell me now if you’re willing to do this. If you want to find another way, then Jessi will take you home. It will be as if this conversation never took place.”

  There was no mommy or daddy to solve this problem, and I remembered the skeletal figure with its glittering eyes and outstretched hand. I nodded, knowing it was solely my decision that could free me from this evil.

  She pulled a small first aid kit from the bag and gave instructions to Jessi on how to bandage the finger after she had finished.

  Granny KeeKee pulled me closer to her and gazed into my face, “Once I’m done, it’s up to you follow my instructions. I will lay everything necessary on the tracks before nightfall, but I’ll tell you now, you can’t cross that section of tracks or go near them for at least three months. Take the long way, don’t go, whatever it takes, just figure it out. If you do what I’m telling you not to, I won’t be able to help you again. I won’t welcome you here, because I’ll know what’s walking in your shadow. When time has passed if you cross those tracks again, you keep your eyes straight ahead and don’t look either way, even if a sound catches your attention. Remember this, your blood is on that iron, and it’s tasted you, I can’t undo that.”

  I nodded and asked the question circling in my mind, “Why did I ever go over to that bag? I was so stupid!”

  The white-haired woman clucked her tongue. “Yes, you were stupid, but it enticed you to look closer. Somebody pulled this evil off themselves with the railroad rooster as a scapegoat, and chances are it has a siren’s call, because only human blood satisfies this thing. They used very dark magic. Whoever did this didn’t care about what would happen to someone who stumbled across it. You’re young, and sensitive which is why you saw it in its true form. Most adults in your situation start by having terrible luck, ill health, nightmares, mental problems, never guessing what’s behind it.”

  Her tone turned a matter of fact, “Ok, no more talking let’s get this over and done with. You need to keep the wound clean and apply antiseptic and fresh bandages once or twice a day. Do you understand?”

  I nodded, and before I realized what was happening, she grabbed my left wrist and placed it on the block. With a small, sharp knife I hadn’t seen she cut downward, taking the tip of my pinky finger before the bone started. I cried out in pain as blood gushed out, and Jessi but a clean towel over it and applied pressure. Granny KeeKee, walked away with my offering inside the burlap bag. She muttered words under her breath and even now, I don’t know if they were prayers or incantations. Then she stopped, as a wave of putrid-like stench engulfed us, and popping noises surrounded the clearing. A sonic boom echoed far off, and the odor disappeared.

  Jessi kept repeating, “Fuck me, fuck me!” as she bandaged my finger. She gave me two pain relievers, a bottle of water and hustled me into her car.

  Silence hung between us on the ride to my house. Once there, I saw the empty driveway, and I was glad my mother had not returned. I turned to Jessi and said, “I’ll never forget what you did for me. If there’s anything I can ever do for you, if it’s within my power, I will do it. This has no end date.” I got out and watched her drive away.

  Later I told my mother I had cut my finger while slicing a piece of bread from a loaf she had baked. She tried to inspect the bandage, but I told her it was ok. She was so busy with the birthday preparation that she took my word for it.

  I put a bottle of aspirin in my small purse and got myself ready to go to my grandparent’s home, because despite what happened earlier today I dared not be alone in the house after nightfall. With my family around me, I pretended to have a good time, and there were moments I did. The normalcy of the surroundings soothed my raw nerves. A sense of detachment settled over me, as if the last forty-eight hours had happened to someone else. The way to my family’s home lay in the other direction from the tracks, and by the time we returned home, I yawned and my eyes fought to stay open. My mother helped me save face by telling me to sleep next to her again just in case I had another dream. Within minutes of closing my eyes slumber washed over me.

  I never saw the yellow-eyed thing again, and I kept my promise to Jessi. A few years later, she married a soldier deployed overseas. Unexpectedly they posted him to a base across the country and she had to move with her two kids from one moment to the next. Jessi didn’t have much family, and since they lived in another state, they could not lend a hand.

  By then I was eighteen years old. I showed up at her house and said, “I am here to help.”

  We spent a week packing her belongings and taking several trips to the town dump. The last chore we completed was cleaning the empty apartment. She rented a small moving truck and a trailer to pull her car. I drove with her across the country. We took turns behind the wheel and looking after her two toddlers. I had enough money put away to buy an airplane ticket to fly back home. We speak from time to time. Life is treating her well, and she is happy. She gave up smoking when she had her kids.

  I never saw Granny KeeKee again. Two years later after her intercession, I overheard a conversation at the farmer’s market that explained why she understood so much about what I found that day on the tracks. While picking fruit, one lady said to another, “You heard about Dr. Keene right?”

  “Who?”

  “She lives on that property off Cherry Blossom Way. She has white hair in a braid.”

  “Oh yeah, yeah I know who you mean.”

  “Well, she’s an anthropologist who spends most of her time going to exotic places around the world, she’s hardly ever here. She made this important discovery, and now her picture is on the cover of National Geographic. Imagine that, someone famous from our little town.”

  They walked away and their voices faded from earshot. I honored my promise to her too and never spoke about what she did that afternoon.

  My family has never figured out why I won’t cross the railroad tracks close to the house. I’ve even gotten hysterical and threatened to get out of the vehicle if they didn’t take an alternate route. Maybe I’ll tell them one day, but for now, I’ll let them chalk it up as one of my peculiarities.

  Sunlight tinges the horizon now, and the train’s whistle has died away. If I forget anything, there is one thing I never will. It’s Granny KeeKee’s words, “Remember this, your blood is on that iron, and it’s tasted you, I can’t undo that.”

  Under the Shade of the Avocado Trees

  The Miami skyline interrupted swollen clouds that l
olled overhead. A sluggish, humid breeze rattled the fronds of palm trees nearby.

  My birthday was also a death-day. Bitter memories and the vines of emotions entwined within them, punish you for ignoring them until the moment of their anniversary. I received my twenty lashes and asked for more.

  The multi-storied building where I spent my day discharged me into the fifth and uppermost floor of the parking garage. My heels tapping on the concrete sounded lonely and garish. It was then that I stopped observing myself. I know that sounds odd, but during the day I felt detached, going through the motions, smiling when someone wished me a happy birthday, and dodging ways to make small talk. I acted surprised when they called me to the conference room and my coworkers surrounded a cake with lighted candles. Where I longed to be was buried deep in my blankets at home, waiting for a new day.

  I slid behind the wheel, brooded and sighed. Memories held at bay flooded the moment like a mudslide, and a yawning sensation of vertigo sucked me back to my life one year before.

  My family gathered in a somber group; some of them wept in muted tones. With hesitating steps I walked down a hospital corridor leading to my grandmother’s room. A coincidence scheduled her double-knee surgery on my birthday, but everyone forgot that significance when the doctor told us there was a complication and that she would not survive the night.

  I approached her bedside, the unmistakable disinfectant odor of the dimly lit hospital room imprinting itself into my olfactory memory. Machinery chimed in different tones next to her. She could not speak, but recognition glinted in her eyes when I bent over her. We both knew it was a farewell.

  Slumped in my car, I wondered how to lessen the homesickness that engulfed me. The saffron brilliance of a spot of sunlight quivering on the hood of my car mesmerized me. The next thing I knew, my car flowed into the traffic drifting like the ebb and flow of the sea, and it pushed me into the city where my family moved in many years before. It was a small southern town where retirees from the North came to escape the ice and snow; its only claim to fame was the Hialeah Race Track. Built in 1925, Seabiscuit, Citation and Seattle Slew galloped around the track pinned at its center by a pond where pink flamingoes preened themselves, ignoring the crowds that gathered during the winter months to cheer on the thoroughbred race horses.

  On the main street I recognized buildings now disguised in other incarnations. The art déco entrance of the corner Five & Dime Shop lay imprisoned behind a neon sign for Frankie’s Pizza. The Dairy Queen with its striped awning and walk-up window where we would line up for a soft-swirl cone lay under the asphalt for a supermarket parking lot.

  Fat raindrops kissed the windshield as I turned into the street where I once lived. The wipers clacked, and I observed people arriving home. They checked mailboxes and tugged children by the hand, eager to escape the downpour promised by the slow drizzle and leaden clouds.

  I remembered a cleaner, sparer street from the past. Flat-roofed bungalows painted in pastel shades with old-fashioned jalousie windows and striped metal awnings sat surrounded by manicured lawns and with an occasional coconut palm tilting romantically by the mailbox. Carports housed convertible Mustangs and Chevy Bel Airs. This was a neighborhood constructed in the prosperous years after World War Two.

  I passed through four-way stop signs honing in on the flash of blue lights that winked a few blocks ahead. Several police cars perched on the edge of the road allowing vehicles to trickle through the street. It was an unusual turn of events, but morbidity was the taste of the day, and it piqued my curiosity. Two doors down from where I once lived the van from the medical examiner’s office parked deep into the lawn. This was Mr. Nash’s house. He was an old man when I was a child, so I knew he was pushing up daisies somewhere.

  At the corner, I nudged my vehicle between two others, and sheltered by a pink pocket umbrella I stepped out into the summer drizzle. The situation afforded me a good reason to act just like another curious passerby.

  I scanned the faces of the people who stood at their porches or fences watching the police activity. They looked like modern day versions of the people that lived here so many years ago; middle-class residents who were wary of a crime being committed where they lived.

  My eyes slid nervously by the house next to Mr. Nash’s. A faint air of menace caused me to eye it but for a moment. Painted a green quartz color, it was one of the few houses on the block that had not been modernized. It reminded me of a bulbous toad. A ‘For Sale’ sign protruded from the front lawn that was sparse and yellow. Emptiness looked out from the dark-lidded eyes of the windows.

  My gaze stopped at the house next to it, changed by renovations as were so many around it. I remembered the first day we came there. The strawberry pink house was tenantless and echoed as the agent jiggled the key in the lock and swung open the door. He breathlessly told us the price had just dropped and it was sure to sell soon. Many years later I learned it sat unoccupied for close to a year. My mother and grandmother inspected the kitchen and bedrooms. I was a small, silent shadow next to my grandfather, as he followed the real estate agent into the back yard.

  We stood under the shade of two huge avocado trees that covered the area like oversized golf umbrellas. A breeze shook the overgrown grass a bit. The agent was showing my grandfather a brick barbecue with a short chimney. It sat under the cool darkness of the overhanging branches.

  He smiled at us, a flash of even white teeth showed as he launched himself into his sales pitch. “Mr. Martin, this is a quiet neighborhood. You can enjoy countless meals with your family here; you’ll make a lot of good memories.”

  He dark hair slicked back with Brylcreem looked like a helmet made of shiny, patent leather. A blue tie squared off with the color of his twinkling eyes. The fragrance of after-shave floated around him, and even in the heat of a summer day he wasn’t sweating.

  He motioned to either side with his hands, indicating the adjacent yards. “Mr. Drysdale is a retired postman; his wife and daughter live with him, and over on the other side is an older lady, named Mary. Next to her is Mr. Nash. He worked in Georgia as a stonemason before he retired, and rumor is he was a moonshiner too. There‘s a family across the street with three kids, so your granddaughter will have playmates. I’ve sold many homes in this area and I can assure you there’s no better place to bring your family to live at.”

  Then he swung around and placed his hand on the brick cooker, “These neighbors around here look out for one another, I can’t tell you how important that is. It’s almost invaluable. As a matter-of-fact Dave, Mary’s friend who lives next door, helped the former owner when he wanted to construct this barbecue. He boasted that he built ones that no hurricane could blow away, and here it is. According to him the secret is to dig a nice, deep pit to anchor the base. He’s helped a few other people on the block with building their own.”

  My grandfather’s silence confused him. He cleared his throat, and lowered his voice, “You know that’s why we don’t pay too much attention to that situation,” he pointed with his chin to the house next door. “Mary is an older lady, and she’s quiet and respectable, and Dave, well... he comes around every few days to keep her company. I think he’s a lonely guy himself, I’m not even sure he has any family. He mows the lawn, prunes the fruit trees, and helps around the house. I hope you understand...” his voice trailed off.

  “I mind my business as long as it doesn’t affect my family, I don’t care what others do with their private lives.” my grandfather replied. Then he continued, “You’re right about this house. It’s well kept, but what happened to the family who lived here before? I can tell they took good care of the place, and made a lot of improvements, the kind people make when they’re not planning to move away.”

  The agent let his breath out and appeared unprepared for my grandfather’s question. “Well,” he cleared his throat as his eyes shifted away. He paused while looking at the ground, “their little girl… something happened to her.”

  My grandf
ather’s jaw tightened. “What happened?” he asked in a low voice.

  “The truth is nobody knows. She disappeared, and the police believe someone kidnapped her, but there were no suspects or witnesses. The case went cold after a few months.”

  “They found no trace of her?” my grandfather asked.

  “No. Her parents thought she was playing with the kids down the street. Her playmates said she came back home to get a toy and somewhere in between someone snatched her away. It took them a couple of hours to realize she wasn’t around. As you can understand, they didn’t want to stay living here; too many memories to battle with every day.”

  My grandfather put his hand on my head. “Has this happened before in this neighborhood?”

  “No, of course not, this was just an isolated incident.” As I looked up at him the first drops of sweat popped out on his brow. Now I realized, seen through an adult’s eyes, that he lied. What saved him his sale was that my mother and grandmother joined us, and they whispered something to my grandfather. The scales tipped in favor of the home, and they bought it.

  My grandfather and mother both worked, and I stayed home with my grandmother. During those long summer days she sent me off to play in the safety of our yard.

  My memory leapfrogged to one day, when I played in a makeshift, ground level tree house my grandfather built against the thick trunk of one of the avocado trees. From the alleyway that ran behind the house voices boomed and boots tramped. I hid lower in my imaginary castle, and then I spied three men emptying the metal trash cans placed on stands against the fence, and placing them back in place with a crash. They talked amongst themselves, but worked with intent. I heard the dull roar of the truck motor that idled on the street waiting to take them to the next block.

  As they walked on the noise receded and silence returned interrupted only by small noises. The noon sun glared down creating pools of shadow where overhanging branches draped over the stretch of tall grass and weeds. Insects hummed in the hot, drowsy air, and birdsong floated in the branches overhead. I stepped out from my cover and looked around. I sighed with relief, and in those few moments my imagination worked against me, and I believed if they saw me, those men would have thrown me in one of those large barrels and carried me off too. My family would have been none the wiser to what happened to me, my shouts drowned out by the clanking of the metal.