Afraid of the Dark

I'm so glad it's sunny today.  I like light.  I mean, I really like light.  Sometimes I go through the house and flip every switch and turn on every lamp. Then I run around and light bunches of candles.  Little campfires to ward off the absence of illumination.

See, I'm afraid of the dark.  Have been as long as I can remember.  I'm scared because--  Well, God, you of all people know why, right?  That omniscient property you have?  Oh, and eternality, that too, you know what they mean, don't you?  You were there.

That fact used to burn me up.  If you were there, in my baby's breath pink room, with lime green shag carpet, and French provincial furniture, why the heck didn't you show up?  Be big.  Call down fire or locusts.  Do some signs, miracles, or wonders.  On my behalf.

As I got to know you though, I backed off the shoulda, coulda, wouldas.  It is what it is.  No amount of tears, wailing, or teeth gnashin' is gonna change the past.  And besides, you had your own bullies--tons.  I only had one. 


In therapy, I tried so hard  not to compare my pain, my experience, with other folks.'  Trust me.  That's a bad place to go.  "What happened to you?"  Counseling clients shouldn't be able to ask that.  It's like houses, cars, wedding rings.  You know how big yours is, what it's worth.  So then you try to figure out if theirs is larger, worse, sicker than yours.

I remember this one time.  I was in a group with a whole bunch of other damaged people.  I didn't say anything, but man, they did.  Jacked their jaws 'til I wanted to smack the big, long conference table and scream--SHUT UP!!

This one lady, she saw a car wreck.  Ooooh!  Scary!!!  She wasn't in the totalled car or anything.  Just watched the accident from the berm.  Said she had PTSD as a result.  Liar.  She just wanted attention.  Was willing to pay $95.00 an hour to get it.  She shoulda taken her money up to WalMart and bought herself a life.

This one gal sat across from me.  Probably 20, maybe 22.  For the longest time she didn't say anything.  Not a peep.  Boy howdy, she was  big.  I saw her lips move.  I cocked my head.

"Excuse me?"

Her voice was wee.  "If I get huge, maybe they won't want me no more."

I leaned toward her.  "Who, sweetie?"

Her gnawed nails traced the woodgrain of the table.

"The bad men.  They tie me up.  Stuff a rag in my mouth.  Drive me to that cabin way out in the woods.  Ever since I was four."

I'm glad she didn't look me in the eye.  No one wants to see pity and horror in someone else's gaze.  My fingers clawed into fists. 

"Who are they?  Where are they?  I'll kill 'em for you. Cut off their--"

Her eyes weren't pretty.  Not even when they got big and shiny with tears.  That just made 'em look muddy.  She folded her head, like she wanted to bury it between her prodigious breasts.  She leaned forward, then back again.  Did that.  Over and over.  Hummed something.  I think it was Ring Around the Rosy.  Wasn't that song about the Black Death?


Jesus, I'm sure glad you're light.  You know how the preacher man always says, "Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life?"  I always thought he said, "The way, the truth, and the light."  I wanted you to be light.  Needed you to be.  And now you are.  To  me.

One time I was at a ladies' luncheon, and a speaker gal told her story.  Dang!  She had a tough rough to hoe.  At the end of her talk though, she said,  in her sweet, quiet, tiny like a wren voice, "As I look back over my life, bad as it was, I wouldn't change a thing."  I almost stood up and said, "Lady, someone needs to knock you up side the head.  You are a fool."

But now? I think I kinda get what she was saying.  It's like the end of the Joseph and the Rainbow Coat story in the Bible.  Joseph told his brothers, the ones who sold him into slavery 'cause he was a goody-two-shoes, "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good, to accomplish what is now being done, the saving of many lives."

I hope I can do that someday.  Save many lives.  From gloom, despair, and agony on them.  I just have to find the afraid-of-the-dark people.  Hand 'em a candle and say, "Guess what, friend?  Jesus is the way, the truth, and the light."

The Scaredest I've Ever Been

This is what it feels like.  To live in a house that’s haunted.  Possessed.    I’ve never seen “Amityville Horror.”  I'm too chicken.  I think I remember the commercial though.  Didn’t it say the house was alive?

Mine’s like that.  My house.  I can feel it breathe.  The frame, underneath the brick skin and Pink Panther insulation flesh, expands and contracts when it takes a breath.  In a rounded way, like ribs.

The house has help.  Being bad.  I can’t see the winged, Notre Dame-like gargoyles, but I can hear ‘em.  Their loose jowls flap.  And slap.  I listen to the splash and slippery drip of their saliva.  No.  It’s drool.  They know supper’s soon.

Do you have any idea why creepy concrete critters, with forked tongues and eyes that bulge, cover God’s fortress?  I’m pretty sure I know.  They’re looking for a crack.  A way in.  Into the goodness.  Where the angels are.  See, they want to devour the cherubs.  Feast on ‘em.  Use their rough and slimy serpentine tongues to lap at the chubby baby bellies.  

They’re ready, can hardly wait, to snap the holy bones and slurp the marrow that leaks out.  Most of all, they wanna chow down on the scarlet, still throbbing angel hearts.  Make pigs of themselves on the sweet, golden goodness that lives on either side of heavenly sternums.  No way, no how, do they want that to ever shine again on God’s green earth.

I didn’t read about these guys in the World Book Encyclopedia.  Didn’t have to.  They tell me their hissy secrets almost every night.  Right before they say, “On your mark.  Get Set.  Go!” 

They whisper and whine, so I’ll worry and fret.  Then I can’t help it.  My fear pheromone.  It leaks out of me.  Like pee.  I’m pretty sure that’s how their slave finds me.  Shhh!  Don’t move.  I think I hear him.

I know!  I’ll think happy thoughts—Myrtle Beach in August, hot chocolate with extra marshmallows—the big ones.  Oh!  The time my cat, Ginger, had kittens in the laundry cabinet in the basement.  I swear.  It smelled like Campbell’s Chicken and Stars soup. 

Here.  I’ll smile.  Aren’t my teeth pretty?  Betcha can’t tell I sucked my thumb ‘til I was 12, and then some.  Maybe I can trick my fear gland, and it won’t spray.  Crap!  It’s too late.  I’ve already started to shake.

Did you hear that?  The squeak?  That’s the stairs.  The ones at the top always creak when he starts down.  And of course.  Here come those dang devil birds.  Every night they flock to my windowsills.  Wrestle for front row privileges.  ‘Cause they wanna . . . gape . . . gawk . . . at . . .

Hey!  Maybe if I pretend I’m asleep, he’ll go away.  Naw.  It won’t work.  It never has before.  Why would it now?

I’ve got it!  I’ll scream.  Really loud.  Inside my head.  “Mom!  Dad!  Somebody!  Help!”  If Kreskin can bend a spoon with his brain, surely I can wake someone with mine.

I sniff.  Smear my snot.  Naw.  That’s never stopped him either.

C’mon!  C’mon!  He’s not on the bottom step yet.  Think!  Think!  Okay!  Okay!  Here’s what I’ll do!  I’ll roll myself up in my sheet and quilt.  Super tight.  Like a Taco Bell enchilada.  Maybe that way, he won’t be able to penetrate.  My defenses.  Not this time.

Mystery in the House Across the Street

Some people swore the house was haunted.  Oh, all right.  It was me.  I said it.  I live across the street.  One morning I walked outside and saw a “SOLD” sign stuck over the one that said “FOR SALE.”  I was stoked.  Maybe someone cool would move in.  A thirteen year-old like me would be great.  Turned out to be a she, a twelve year-old girl.  Not a guy, but still.  

           

I heard her way before I saw her.

            “I won’t do it again!” she said.  “You can’t make me!”

            It was almost dark.  I stopped my bike when I heard her.   Looked up at the third floor window.  There was a light on, and the curtain, what was left of it, was all raggedy and see through   The window must’ve been open because I could hear everything.

            “Baby!  Don’t (sob)--  Make (gasp)-- Me (whimper)--  Shoot.”  It was a woman’s voice.  Her mom’s gonna kill her?  That’s sick.  

            I let my bike fall over so I could pull my backpack off.  Maybe I heard wrong.   I rooted through my pack.  I keep everything in there.  Two years of scouts had taught me to be prepared.  I dug out my binoculars case and snapped it open.  Stepped behind my neighbor’s bushes and pointed the binoculars at the window.

            Bang!  The gunshot made me jump.  It wasn’t real loud.  Sounded like a little kid’s pop gun.  Even so, the blast pushed the girl across the room.  Her back hit the wall, and she slid to the ground.  Holy crap!  She was petite, with loads of dark hair.  I winced as blood trickled down her chin.  I got my cell phone out.  To dial 9-1-1.  Dang it! It was dead.

            I sprinted to my house.  Opened the front door and yelled.
            “Mom!”

            “I’m in the shower, Shane.”

            I took the stairs two at a time and stood beside the bathroom door.

            “I think someone just got killed over at the new people’s house.”

            “You what?  Now why would you say something like that?”

            I leaned against the wall and rolled my eyes.  “I’m serious, Mom.  I heard a gun and—“

            “A gun?  No, you didn’t, Shane. Those people haven’t even moved in yet.  There's never been a moving truck or cars.  Besides--”

            “I know, but—“

            “It was probably fireworks," she said.  "Or maybe someone clapped.  I swear!  You’re so dramatic.”

            I snorted.  Clapped?  Seriously? 

            “I’m going back out,” I said.  “I bet the police’ll come.”

           

I waited for the cops.  They never came.  I got ready to go inside to call 'em, but then the whole thing started over.  Like instant replay.

            “I won’t--” 

            “Don’t make me--" 

            Bang!

            That’s when I got it.  The house is haunted.  The woman and girl are ghosts.  The whole scene probably runs over and over.  Forever.  Guess I'd held my breath 'cause all of a sudden, it came out in a rush. I stood there for a minute, then I grinned.  Ghosts?  Ghosts live across the street from me?  Cool.

           

The next day I was on my bike when I heard a car go up the alley behind the new people’s house. Then it came down the street.  Toward me.  Fast.  My mouth fell open when I saw the dark-haired girl in the front seat.  What the--?  I huffed.  The alley!  They keep their car ‘round back! 

            The killing mom slowed the car and yelled out the window.

            “Move it, kid.  We’ve got places to go.  People to see.”

            I stayed put.  “Where you going?”

            “For your information, Mr. Nibby, Mystery here has an audition in exactly one hour.  We want to be first in line.”

            My eyebrows went up. “Audition?”

            The girl leaned over.  “Yeah.  They wanna see if I can cry and die.  Now move!”

            She’s even prettier up close. 

            I tilted my head.  “You act?  For real?  Me too.”

            “Cool.  We’ll talk later.  Go, Mom.”

           

Me and Mystery?  The girl who wasn’t a ghost?  We became best friends.  Until she kissed me.  After that?  Nothing was ever the same again after that.