Entertaining the Halloween Muse
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“A Happening”
by David Pyle
In my experience, most tales of the unknown occur in twilight and shadow of darkness. And rightly so. It is the gray of evening, the mist of dawn, and the drear of darkness that incites human imagination to the unexpected. This is not such a tale. In fact, I have no cliché to describe this daytime betrayal of the senses. I’ll simply call it A Happening.
It was a sharp fall October morning. The sun was up in all its splendor, with white biscuits of clouds in the sky moving in haste, shoved by a brisk cold north wind. I’d taken my pen and tablet and hot cup of coffee to sit on my homemade park bench, in the nearby wood, in hopes of entertaining some creative thoughts.
The thick enclave of oaks all around were still covered in green, betraying the change of seasons. Heavy leaves refusing to relinquish their summertime color as well as their hold on the season, were now clapping furiously to the tune of the hard gusts of wind overhead.
The sounds of nature were comforting as I downed the last warm sip of coffee, allowing the peace to draw me into my usual lull before entertaining a few crisp creative interludes to which I was so accustomed. Today’s peace was interrupted by the insistent motion of clouds passing between the sun and the shadowy cape above me. As each cloud passed, its shadow raced through the undergrowth, disappearing almost as quickly as it appeared. It was merely a distraction at first; however, the distractions, once noticed, were becoming a nuisance to my concentration. At each passing, and despite my fueled resistance, my eyes chased the sharp edges of each apparition as if hypnotized by their very motion.
It seemed that a clutch of nearby cedars began to harbor the final travels of each definitive shadow. As if each one were seeking solace from the daylight, darting under the moving cloud cover and seeking refuge. At the very thought, I whimsically pictured each racing shade as a night terror, in migration to some unknown destination, the closest of which was my small country cottage.
Now my pen and tablet, useless and inept, sat on the bench under the weight of the cold dregs of my coffee cup, as I watched what I now determined to be a secret gathering of shadows.
Suddenly, a cold gust of northerly wind pushed under my flannel collar, brushing against my skin like cold lifeless fingers, breaking the spell of the moment and the whimsy deserted me. My breath shuddered as I looked away, counting the irregular beats of my quickened heart. I stood immediately, stretched, built my courage and strolled down a narrow dirt path, soon to be covered in a layer of colorful leaves, toward the darkness of the bosky clump of cedars that had me spellbound.
I then realized it was nearing the brunch time of the morning and felt the lost hours drain my resolve. Nearer still, I avoided a direct confrontation of the impenetrable darkness of spined needles and circled out of the line of woods into the broad sunlight of the small meadow. There I stood waiting, and my wait was barely seconds. From deep in the refuge of the oaks, raced the trailing edge of a shadow and I watched in awe as it halted within the cluster of cedars, never to venture past the line of forest oaks!
No shadow continued on or raced across the open field, following the wind driven clouds. Only a gray wisp of dimmed sunlight whizzed past my view, one after another, after another.
Was this an anomaly of focus? Did the open canopy above form an optical aperture, concentrating the sunlight into sharper lineage?
Curiosity overcame my apprehension as I eased back into the curious world of moving shadows. In the distance, I glimpsed my cup and tablet with briskly moving sunlight dancing fancifully across the wooden bench. Then once again came the defined outline of shadow, racing, racing past my hiding place, racing through the woods, racing straight toward where I stood. There to my right, into the cedar darkness, the shadow stopped, and glared back at me.
A lowly gust of chilled air ruffled the edges of the cedars as the darkness inside them shrugged at my insistence. It moved as if alive, aware that I had discovered their presence.
How many shadows were gathered inside?
I turned to look at my cottage in the distance, under a hovel of tall pines. I could just hear them. Cool diffused air shifted through their needles, whispering softly, playing their gentle song of nature. My cottage was hardly a stone’s throw across the clearing, and my head spun back toward the cedars where some unknown nemesis huddled in the darkness, hiding there, palpable, watching me.
Bravely, I abandoned my coffee cup and pad, as I backed slowly toward my refuge, watching the watchers, watching me, watching them. How many eyes surveyed my lowly awkward steps toward my cottage, while trapped in their shadowy burrow? When I turned to hurry those last few feet, through the obstacles of my yard, I felt those eyes burrowing into my very back, up my spine, into my mind. I barely remember opening the door, barely remember turning to peer out to the line of peaceful woods in the distance. It was then that I knew. When sunset fell, when true nighttime arrived, and darkness filled the expanse between us, they would come for me.
Happy Halloween
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