Back in high school we would dare rival cliques to dress as ghosts (white sheets, eye holes poorly cut out - the works) and walk single file through Friday Woods. Most refused of course - they were at that age where ghosts weren't cool and nothing was scary to them. Without a potential risk or thrill it was seen as pointless.
Still, the few that went came back with their stories that soon became playground legends.
Noeline McCallister and a few other music kids went (witnessed by the year group above them, as per tradition). Their strategy was to play classical folk tunes in the hopes that nothing weird would happen and that they'd all come back just as they left.
This did not happen.
As they began their rendition of Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes all the birds flew from the immediate area. This should have been enough to startle them into sense but they had a dare to win and so their little parade carried on, aiming for the bridge on the other side of the woods.
It took them twenty minutes to get there, all the while they heard sharp laughter between the pauses in their notes. It took them twenty minutes to realise they had been walking with an extra person who somehow played the harp, flute and violin all in one sound.
They looked at each other, trying not to state too hard at the shoddily cut eyeholes of the unknown being playing alongside them and, without a single word spoken, they all turned back and prayed their guest would leave them.
They did not leave the group until they got to the very edge of Friday Woods.
Whatever had followed them couldn't leave, instead they stood there clutching their harp until it cracked in half before turning slowly and running back into the depths of the woods. It left behind a trail of long grey hair tangled with mud that each of the children kept a strand of for good luck.
Other groups, like the relay team,turned it into a competition. The Ghost Run. Some even went weekly as a part of their training but those people weren't quite normal - they had an air of uncanniness about them as though someone had the idea of a child but didn't know how to make one function without the occasional flicker of Otherness.
Like Green-Eyed Jamie who went through Friday Woods to get home each day, every time dressed as a ghost and holding a large bushel of sage. Everyone else thought she was a witch but she protested that it was something her nan had taught her - sage to keep danger away.
She never ran into any oddities in all her years of travelling back and forth through the woods- at least, none that she would ever mention. Come to think of it, she never talked about what anybody else had seen in the woods, not even if it was the Big News Of The Week around school.
Maybe she never ran into anything and her sage really did protect her.
Maybe she was the thing that everyone else ran into.
Still, the few that went came back with their stories that soon became playground legends.
Noeline McCallister and a few other music kids went (witnessed by the year group above them, as per tradition). Their strategy was to play classical folk tunes in the hopes that nothing weird would happen and that they'd all come back just as they left.
This did not happen.
As they began their rendition of Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes all the birds flew from the immediate area. This should have been enough to startle them into sense but they had a dare to win and so their little parade carried on, aiming for the bridge on the other side of the woods.
It took them twenty minutes to get there, all the while they heard sharp laughter between the pauses in their notes. It took them twenty minutes to realise they had been walking with an extra person who somehow played the harp, flute and violin all in one sound.
They looked at each other, trying not to state too hard at the shoddily cut eyeholes of the unknown being playing alongside them and, without a single word spoken, they all turned back and prayed their guest would leave them.
They did not leave the group until they got to the very edge of Friday Woods.
Whatever had followed them couldn't leave, instead they stood there clutching their harp until it cracked in half before turning slowly and running back into the depths of the woods. It left behind a trail of long grey hair tangled with mud that each of the children kept a strand of for good luck.
Other groups, like the relay team,turned it into a competition. The Ghost Run. Some even went weekly as a part of their training but those people weren't quite normal - they had an air of uncanniness about them as though someone had the idea of a child but didn't know how to make one function without the occasional flicker of Otherness.
Like Green-Eyed Jamie who went through Friday Woods to get home each day, every time dressed as a ghost and holding a large bushel of sage. Everyone else thought she was a witch but she protested that it was something her nan had taught her - sage to keep danger away.
She never ran into any oddities in all her years of travelling back and forth through the woods- at least, none that she would ever mention. Come to think of it, she never talked about what anybody else had seen in the woods, not even if it was the Big News Of The Week around school.
Maybe she never ran into anything and her sage really did protect her.
Maybe she was the thing that everyone else ran into.
No comments:
Post a Comment