Combined word count (Yesterday and Today): 2,792 words
Running total: 35,056 words
Summary: The mystery of Grindstone is further investigated.
Also, there is a guy in a newsboy cap, although at the last second I almost gave him a trilby.
My mind wanders a bit more. I think of the news casting club, my new friends—Chase, Brian, Ashley, and Scarlett. They’ve all been so helpful and supportive. I owe my life to them. I realize that if I can’t live for my own happiness, I can live for them, at least. They’d be crushed if I was gone. And after all they’ve done for me, it’s the very least I can do for them.
After I resolve that, I sit up, feeling a little bit better. I briefly wonder if—and if not, how long—that good feeling and resolve will last, but I brush it off. I have much better things to be doing right now than moping around.
~~~
“Kenneth?”
Sure, I hear a voice, but I’m not ready to get up yet. How early is it, anyway? Do I have to be up yet? I thought ghosts only came out at night. I pretend to still be asleep, hoping that maybe they’ll eventually give up and leave without me.
“Hey, Kenneth.” I feel the shape of the mattress change as weight is added. Someone is sitting on my bed. I make a low groaning noise and adjust my position in bed, hoping that whoever has taken the responsibility to wake me will take that as a “sorry, try again later” and leave without me.
Then a hand on my shoulder, gently shaking me. “Kenneth, it’s morning. Rise and shine.”
Yeah, morning. I wonder how early he means by such a vague term. I don’t move any more. Anything to get him to leave… please, just let me be. Unfortunately, he continues with this plan of attack, shaking me at two more intervals and calling my name. But I am persistent as he is, and I refuse to wake up.
“Mr. Williams, can we just go without him?” Another voice says. I think it’s Chase; he has a particularly distinctive voice.
There is a sigh. “No, I don’t want to leave Kenneth here. After all, he’s the star player in these endeavors, isn’t he?”
Mostly silence. It sounds like someone is slowly pacing and another person sighs (or maybe it’s the same person; I can’t tell), but eventually Mr. Williams speaks again.
“All right. It doesn’t look like Kenneth is going to be waking up any time soon. Why don’t we all take it easy for a few hours, maybe grab some breakfast?”
A pause. Then a third voice says, “Well, if we’re not going immediately, I’m going back to bed. Anyone mind?”
The weight shifts off my bed, although I hear a clunk. “Ow! Um… yeah, Brian, yeah, that’s fine. Chase, what do you want to do?”
“Ehh… I’ll come down for breakfast. Might as well eat something now. Brian, you want me to bring anything for you?”
“Dude, you’re not supposed to take food out of the mess hall—“
“I can smuggle it. What, you think I don’t know how to bend or break the rules when I need to?” A chuckle. “Now, you want anything?”
“If they have something sweet, save it for me. Fresh fruit, donuts, whatever—I just want something sweet.”
“All right. See you later.”
“Bye!”
I hear footsteps, a door being opened and then shut, and then more footsteps growing steadily fainter. Once they fade completely, I hear a whisper.
“Kenny, I know you’re awake, man.”
I slowly open my eyes and turn my head to find Brian hovering over my bed. He’s grinning.
“Yeah?” I mumble, still sleepy.
“Thanks for doing that. I’m still exhausted. It’s just 7:00 AM, and the want us to be up already. Can you believe it?”
I shake my head slowly. Brian just smiles a little more broadly and climbs up to his bunk. I turn my head and fall asleep again.
~~~
At about 9:30 AM, I’m fully awake. So is everyone else, apparently; we’re all meeting in the common room of the lodgings and Scarlett is briefing everyone on the particular mission of the day. I notice that Brian is snacking on a whole carton of strawberries—Chase apparently does know how to smuggle food to a cabin. Let’s just hope no furry woodland animals want strawberries as much as he does.
“All right. We’re going to split up into two teams,” Scarlett informs us. Team A is the news investigation team. We’re going to be traveling around and doing a sort of initial report on the legend; something we can show to the school. I doubt we’ll actually try and film the ghost this time. If we catch him—yay us!” Scarlett does some weird half-jazz hands, half-fist pump motion to punctuate this. “If not—that’s fine too. But we need to get footage regardless. On this team will be me, Chase, Kenneth and Mr. Williams.
“Team B will be digging up some more information on Grindstone. We found plenty of news articles, sure…” Scarlett crosses over as she says this. I think I read somewhere that presenters move back and forth while they present to keep the attention of listeners. I’m not sure how well this works, but I’m not going to argue it doesn’t—I have no proof to prove that it does or does not. “…But some more interviews and the like certainly couldn’t hurt us. Some first-hand accounts and the like, you know? Brian, Ashley, and Ms. White will be on this team.
“We’re going to split up immediately. Ashley, do you have the list of places I suggest you search?”
“Right here!” Ashley waves a sheet of paper around, then sticks it into an empty plastic sleeve in her binder.
Scarlett nods approvingly. “All right, then. I’ll lead the other team to our location. Everyone ready?”
No one really says anything of note as we split into our separate parties. I feel a little bit bad for Brian and Ashley, getting such a secondary job. I’m not even sure if I understand the importance of the separate groups. And I especially don’t understand why I’m in this group. Wouldn’t it be better if I was in the group digging deeper into the legend? They seem to be more likely to run into my next meal.
But I don’t argue. Arguing with Scarlett is a big mistake, it’s asking for trouble. Let her have her way and everything will be fine.
Our group heads away from the center of this property, this area. It’s called “Sandstone,” specifically, although I have no idea why. There aren’t any sandstone mines or caves near here that I know of; just lots and lots of rolling meadows, forests, and a big lake. But towards the center of Sandstone is the mess hall and a few other cabins; basically as close as the Audubon Society gets to civilization. Our personal cabin is a bit deeper in the woods, and apparently not too far from a large barn.
“I read somewhere there’s a lot of summer camps in this area,” Mr. Williams informs us. “They use that barn for recreational sports.”
“But more importantly than the barn…” Scarlett announces this, but trails off and starts running around aimlessly, as if she’s looking for something. Chase and I look at her expectantly, waiting for her to finish her sentence, but the end just doesn't come.
Finally, Chase asks, “More importantly than the barn… is what?”
“I know it’s around here somewhere…” Scarlett mumbles. She’s obviously stressed about her great and dramatic finish being ruined by her inability to find the subject of the talk. Eventually, she beckons to us. “Just follow me.”
We comply and continue making circles around the barn while Scarlett frantically looks left to right and keeps mumbling to herself. Eventually, she comes to a complete stop, her head pointing in a specific direction. “There it is!” She exclaims, moving toward it at a run. We all do our best to keep up with her, although Chase has a little trouble doing so while holding his clunky camera. We stop in front of a little shack—it might have once been a cottage but it is that no longer. It’s sagging in many places and overall is a depressing building.
“There it is.” Scarlett repeats, looking at the building with awe. Then, she suddenly adds, “Wait, let me check,” and pulls out a tourist map of the Sandstone area. Looking first at the map, then at the building, then back at the map, and finally towards the surrounding area, she confirms, “Yep, this is it. Grindstone’s house.”
Chase scratches the back of his head. “That’s it?”
Scarlett smiles at him mischievously, although it looks a little bit seductive at the same time. “What were you expecting, some sort of landmark?” She begins pacing again as she provides more exposition on Jeremiah “Grindstone” Tate and the legend surrounding him. Chase himself senses the massive exposition about to take place and starts the camera rolling. “The Audubon society does not at all advertise the ghost in the area. Unlike the ghost stories surrounding a lot of other famously haunted locations, Grindstone is a much more dangerous ghost—both to the people around him and to Sandstone’s reputation. I mean, do you hear of anyone being brutally murdered at Gettysburg regularly? On the other hand, a new murder featuring Grindstone’s apparent modus operandi occurs around once a decade, maybe twice a decade if he’s really angry, once a score if you’re lucky.”
I almost ask what a score is, again, but Chase notices my apparent look of confusion and mutters “A score’s twenty years. You know, four score and seven years ago.”
And that last part sounds vaguely familiar to me, too, but I don’t know where from. I let it slide. It can’t be that important.
Scarlett continues, “They call this place the sugar shack now, and they use it to process some of Sandstone’s own grains and the like. But apparently if you step inside, you’ll see the tools—old, rusty tools, but they’re in there nonetheless.”
I smile and try to make my voice as menacing as I possibly can. “Just waiting to be sharpened and used once again…”
Chase laughs nervously. For being as scared of ghosts as he is, he’s taking this pretty well (although you can still tell he’s a bit apprehensive of the situation). Noticing that this could take a turn for the worse very fast, Mr. Williams butts in. “All right. Well, it’s there. Can we get inside to take a look at it?” He pauses. “It seems like something they’d keep locked.”
Scarlett walks up to the shack and pulls at the knob. Nothing. “As a matter of fact, Mr. Williams, it is something they keep locked! Hey, Chase, you can turn off the camera right now.”
“All righty, then.” Chase does as instructed.
“It’s a dead end for now. Let’s hope that Brian and Ashley have a bit of luck on their end with finding someone with a key who’s interested in a school project…” Realizing that the situation sounds a bit ridiculous, Scarlett laughs. “Until then, do you want to scope out a few more locations and try and film an intro to the episode?”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” I say.
---------------------------
Scene XIII
Oooh, Unlucky Number!
Brian
So, sometimes, you know, I’m a bit clairvoyant. I know that sounds ridiculous, but I’m serious. Like, I think these really profound thoughts about other people in the middle of nowhere, and these thoughts turn out to be true. It’s a gift.
And at this moment, I just realized that this Grindstone dude must have lived in a little house somewhere in Sandstone.
“Hey, Ashley,” I ask, “Did Grindstone live in a little house somewhere in Sandstone? You know, like… around here?”
Ashley nods at me, wide-eyed. “Yes, he did, in fact! It was far away from any other buildings in the area. That’s why people had trouble finding him in the middle of winter… and why he passed away. Look, I have a picture here—“
“I don’t need to see it,” I say, holding up a hand. “But I just realized something.”
I wait for someone to ask me what I just realized, but Ashley just stands there looking at me with those enormous inquisitive eyes. Finally, Kenny’s mom asks, “Well… go on. What did you just realize?”
I smile. I’m going to blow their minds with this. “Okay, so, a lot of the properties on here have keys to them, right? To keep tourists and other stupid people from entering every building they see.” I pace a little to the left like Scarlett does. That’s supposed to keep people’s attention. “Well, the people who run this place probably especially don’t want dumb people running into Grindstone’s house. They have to do whatever they can not to piss him off, you know?” Then I move to the right. “So, if we really want to do this show right, we need a key to the shack, or at least someone who has a key to the shack who’s willing to help us out at this.”
Ashley claps her hands together, a look of profound enlightenment on her face. “Wow, Brian, you’re right!”
Kenny’s mom, on the other hand, doesn’t look quite as pleased with my deduction. In fact, it looks like it concerns her. “This brings up more problems,” she says in a low tone.
You know, she’s right, too.
I haven’t known Kenny’s mom for a long time, but I like her already. She’s not, like, pretending to be young or anything—that’s just stupid and always messes up your kid permanently—but she’s not boring and old-fashioned, either. She doesn’t seem to be afraid of getting her hands dirty if it means she can help her son. And you know what? That’s just awesome. I wish my mom was that cool. I mean, my mom’s pretty cool and all, but she’s not that cool. She’d probably freak if I came home as a were-ghost that ate other ghosts.
We all stand there in silence, not one of us wanting to say the next obvious course of action. I mean, one of us really should say it, so we’re all on the same page, but it’s such an obvious deduction that whoever says it is going to sound really, really stupid.
Kenny’s mom decides to take one for the team and says, “Well, then, I guess we should find someone with the keys, then.”
I sigh. “Yep! Sounds good to me.”
Easier said than done, though.
You see, no one so far has been willing to help us. A lot of the staff members, it seems, have never even heard of Grindstone’s legend. And the ones who do pretend like they don’t. We already drove out to the visitor’s center, and they were as helpful as something that isn’t helpful at all. Like, I don’t know, what’s not helpful? Mapquest? Yeah. They were as helpful as Mapquest.
So our next stop is just the staff members around Sandstone, but even that’s not going well. We’ve asked half the kitchen staff and none of them have not been able to help. They’ve been a lot friendlier than the people at the visitor’s center, at least. I don’t know if this is a state park or not. Are they considered rangers or not? Well, whatever…
It looks like we’re going to go and ask the other half of the kitchen staff now. We’re keeping a tally of who we asked—make sure to get their names and give a brief physical description of them in a little notebook I’m keeping. As we stand outside the kitchen, waiting for someone to come out so we can ambush and ask them, I look over this list.
Marc—older, missing a front tooth
Adrienne—twentyish, red hair in a ponytail
Abe—looks really young, dark curls
…Okay, so the kitchen staff isn’t too big, but they’re feeding like what, us, a few staff members, and maybe two other groups? They don’t need to be big. And damn, they produce good enough food as it is. I have no fucking clue what was in that soup last night—it could have been the brains of dead children for all I know—but it was delicious. Too bad Kenny can’t eat it anymore.
And then someone else comes out of the kitchen, carrying the compost bin from lunch. I record some notes about his appearance in the appropriate column in my book—he looks to be in his mid to late twenties, although I’m bad with ages. I can’t really see his hair color or style because it’s hidden in a tweed newsboy cap. Which isn’t really a big kind of hat at all, so he must have really short hair. I make note of that. As he turns away from us, I note that his hair is blond, but indeed very short.
“Hey, uh… excuse me,” I call. The man stops and looks at me expectantly. “Can I have your name? I’m conducting
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment