Midnight Travels

Happy Halloween! Well, the day after Halloween as I find myself making this post. Seeing as it is that time of year, I wanted to take a break from reviewing media and share a spooky short story I wrote a few months back. I was inspired after driving through country back roads one night because there’s something just so unsettling about that environment. Enjoy.

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When you live out here in the countryside, you don’t stay out at night. You wake up with the sun, and you go to sleep with the sun. That was the first lesson my pappy taught me when I was scarcely higher than his knee. That’s why when you had to go into town, or another neighboring farm needed your help for the day, you got there early, and you came home early. You stayed for dinner if you could, but if the daylight wasn’t on your side, no one batted an eye when you politely excused yourself.

We’re not afraid of the dark. No, that’s not why we avoided those nighttime travels. Most of the reasons were purely rational. When it gets dark, no matter how well you know the land, you’re likely to get lost. The night could get so deep that there was nary a difference betwixt standing there on the road or sitting in your cellar with your eyes closed. You could always bring a lantern with you, but the meager glow they offered just ain’t enough. No; being out there in the dark is like standing on the precipice of some great oblivion, like staring down at the edge of a cliffside or gazing out into the bottomless waters of some ancient fishin hole.

Aloysius Bringstik was always the lesson my pappy used when warning us bout the dark. Aloysius was a farmer, just like any of us. He was born and raised here. He grew up running down the backroads, so it’s no exaggeration to say that he knew this land just as well as anyone.

He was fifty-four years old when he disappeared. His brother-in-law, Silas, needed some help one summer day. Silas grew potatoes. Something was getting into his potatoes and ruining them. One morning, he found a big, ugly orange beetle stuck to the leaves of one of his crops. He ripped the thing off and smashed it to pulp under his thick leather boot. The leaves were ragged and the potatoes themselves were impossible to salvage. Silas couldn’t afford another poor harvest, so he reached out to as many family members as he could.

Aloysius went and spent the day helping his kin. They were so engrossed in eradicating the pests that they didn’t stop until the sun sank beneath the horizon. Now, the smart thing would’ve been for Aloysius to spend the night. Unfortunately, he was a dutiful husband who had to take his quarrelsome wife into town early the next mornin. So he left into the night, wishing his brother-in-law a good night and a happy harvest.

Aloysius knew the way. It wasn’t a far trek, only about five miles with two turns total. He could’ve done the walk in his sleep. He should have been able to do the walk in his sleep. But in the darkness, distance gets unreliable. You second-guess how long you’ve been walking or miss that obvious landmark you always know to keep an eye out for. Aloysius never made it back home. No one knows for sure what happened to him, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is that a man left for home in the dark and vanished into thin air.

So he became a cautionary tale; a warning to the community about what happens when you try to trust the darkness.

Of course, there is another reason. The dark isn’t scary. No, it’s the things inside the dark that are.

Men… they’ve seen things out here. Things they can’t explain. Some claim to hear voices coming from the edges of their land.

The voices are familiar.

Comforting.

Pleading.

One night, a man heard someone calling his name from the outer dark. It sounded like his wife. He rolled outta bed, put his boots on, and nearly walked right out his door till it dawned on him that his wife had been sleeping next to him the whole time, and she hadn’t stirred once since he got up.

The wolves get more aggressive. Hell, the deer get more aggressive. One woman had lingered at the creek doing laundry one day. She left for home as the sun was setting, made it halfway back, then ran the last leg after a herd of deer started chasing her. And this wasn’t a case of her startling them or anything; she claims they emerged from the underbrush and began following her. She uncomfortably stole glances back, but the beasts stayed their course.

There was something wrong about them.

She couldn’t explain it, but they didn’t look quite right. At first they kept their distance. Then they grew bolder, choosing to draw closer, before outright chasing her down.

If there’s one lesson I hope to have imparted on my children, it’s that there are things out there that we aren’t meant to see. God made us for the day. Those things that come out at night, those aren’t in His image. I’ve lived a long, fortuitous life.

That almost wasn’t the case.

Thirty years ago, I had just begun to court a lovely young lady on a farm a few miles from my own. I spent my early morning hours working on my own chores, then I would walk to her father’s farm where I would join them for lunch. Then I’d help him with the daily tasks. Dinner was a coin flip; sometimes I would eat there, other times I would head back home.

One day, I had finished helping her father plant some seeds. It was a long, grueling day, and I was tired. It was late enough that I could either eat dinner with them, or travel home where my portion was almost certainly already in the dog’s stomach. Staying the night was out of the question, so I let my belly answer for me. After dinner, my beloved took me on a quick walk around the farm. I should have refused, but I was so sweet on her that I always struggled to tell her anything but “yes.” She rewarded me with a peck on the cheek and a fond farewell until tomorrow.

As I took my first step onto the road, the sun sank below the horizon. I could feel the heat dissipating, getting absorbed into the ground just like the bulbous yellow lightgiver. I made it a mile before the last vestiges of sight began to fail me.

The pall of night was fast.

So much faster than I could have anticipated.

The doubts came fastest.

“Was that the tree I turn right at?”

“What was that sound?”

“How long have I been walking?”

I talked to no one in particular because the sound of my voice reverberatin in the dark was better than the soft scuffling of my feet in the dirt, and whatever else my ears thought they heard.

The moon was no help. Even were it full, the shifting clouds and overhead canopies of knotted tree branches made it impossible to see anything. My heart began to beat faster as I grew more and more nervous.

Then I saw a light.

It was a small and sickly orange and bobbed up and down. At first I thought that my eyes were playing tricks on me, but as I stopped and stared, I saw the light coming closer and closer.

Eventually a man came into view. He looked to be about my age, maybe older. It was hard to tell. A dark cloak was pulled around his clothes, obscuring them. He held an iron lantern in one hand. Dull orange embers clattered about inside. He stopped about five paces from me.

“And where might you be heading?” the man croaked. His voice was crisp, energetic, yet deep and gravelly. It sounded vaguely familiar.

“Just on my way back home,” I answered.

“Awfully late, ain’t it?” He lowered his outstretched arm, drawing the lantern close to his side.

“Unfortunately,” I acknowledged, “but sometimes we don’t get to choose the circumstances we find ourselves in.”

The man laughed at that one. I noticed how pale his skin was in the soft glow of his lantern; I couldn’t see much, only his knifelike nose and gaunt cheeks.

“Are you lost? Need a hand findin your path?”

“I’ll find my way back,” I answered evasively. My nose curled as I noticed a horrid stench. It smelled like something was rottin. My eyes began to water.

“Tsk tsk tsk.” He clicked his tongue. “That’s what I thought. Here.” He stretched his arm out, handin the lantern to me. Instinctively I went to take it, then pulled my hand back. My breathin grew faster. I began to notice more rips and tears in his cloak.

“Who are you?” I whispered.

“My name ain’t important,” he said dismissively. He jangled the lantern. “Take it. You need it more than I do.”

I simply stood and stared at his outstretched arm. The cloak covered most of it, but I could see slivers of skin through the tears and gaps in the fabric. It looked white as snow. It seemed strangely smooth. The texture of his skin looked… off.

“Thank you for the offer, but I must be on my way now.” I walked past him, not darin to look back. Something in the pit of my stomach told me to run. To run as far and as fast as I could. To trust in my feet and let them guide me back home.

I made it three steps past him when he said something else to me. I’ll remember those cursed words until the day I die.

“Aloysius thought he could find his way back in the dark too. He turned the lantern down once…”

I spun around.

The figure raised the lantern up to his face. A gust of wind tore his hood back. The rotten visage of an older man stared back at me. His eyes were white and glassy. His nose hung from an angle. His lips had long been lost to the elements. His hair was white and ratty. A worm wriggled in his cheek.

“…I accepted the lantern the next time it was offered.”

I turned and ran. I ran as fast as I could because I knew the truth. I’ve kept this tale to myself all these years for one reason or another. I know what I saw out there that night. I’m sure some would believe me, but I also know that others would think me crazy. So I warned my children. And my children’s children. They believe me. They know that out there, in the darkness, lurk things we can’t understand. Things that shouldn’t be there.

So when the sun sets, you should join it in restful slumber.

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