Walls of Jericho

Halloween

By Martin Moody, October, 2019.

It had been a long hard week already when I arrived at work on that most haunted Thursday morning. And with the weather turning into a constant state of flux, swinging wildly between sweaty hot to unpleasant cool, as the days became shorter as Fall began to strip the trees of their leaves; all sense of normalcy had been turned on its head: it wasn’t hot and it wasn’t cold, it was just weird, to say it mildly: making sleeping at night extremely difficult so, I was having a difficult time without any further interjections maintaining concentration.  

And as a twisted surprise to me and all my coworkers, at twelve 0-one noon, a group of our supervisors came strolling up to the group of us pulling a little Red Flyer wagon, like one that might be bought for a child at Christmas—filled with candy and treats of all types.

They, our supervisors, were all laughing and carrying on with much delight, as they encouraged us to take as much of the candy from the little red wagon as we pleased, for they said, “they, had pulled a prank on us” and that we were dismissed for the rest of the day with full pay, because all the “rest” of the appointments that were on the schedule for the day had been “made-up” to “instill in us” to work hard that morning because they  wanted to give us the rest of the day off, i.e. they wanted the afternoon off as well, Happy Halloween; and well see you in the Morning.

Exhausted, but relieved that all I had left to do was clean up the mess I had created in the flurry of activities earlier that morning; I quickly busied myself with exiting the premises.

I really wasn’t expecting to have the afternoon off but, had ridden my motor-bike to work that day in order to stretch it’s legs a bit in anticipation of a longer ride on that upcoming weekend. So now, with a bit of extra time on my hands, I hadn’t expected, I decided to take a little extended ride through the country on my way home to just relax as the wind blew on my face.

Soon the busy lunch-rush traffic-jams downtown subsided as I made my way out toward the suburbs that surround my glorious city; where I happened across a side street I hadn’t ever noticed before.

It was kind of dark, heavily overgrown with dangling limbs from old growth hard woods that had seemed to have not been cut in some time, but passible: and me being in a mindset for adventure thought, I’ll just check this path out and see where it leads? May come in handy someday to know… might be a faster way home???

The road didn’t have any houses on it. And, as I recall now thinking back, there weren’t any business either I recalled seeing. It was just a path, for a long distance, that seemed to entice me more and more the further I navigated it’s increasing twist and turns.

And at just about the time I would have been naturally disturbed of its final destination the road opened up into fields of waving tall grass and glorious sweeping winding threads across a vast countryside.

It was a fabulous trail. I was so glad I had found it. And, as my cycle sped through the open expanses, ahead I noted more trees.

And as I approached the trees, the road surface gently transitioned from the customarily recognized pavement of any modern city street to a wonderfully cared for dirt wonderland.

It didn’t bother me at all to be on a dirt road, I’ve ridden down many before, but it did bring quickly to my mind; to be on the lookout for wild-life. It wouldn’t be good at all to hit an animal, seeing I was on a motor-bike.

The trees greatly decreased the distance I could see to my left, and to my right; but ahead I could begin to make out an old covered bridge, I thought was most interesting.

And as I got closer to it, I could tell, the bridge had been constructed many years ago, and I almost hesitated crossing it, in fear it might not be sturdy, or possibly; have a loose nail protruding from it that might puncture one of my tires… but, the closer I got to it; it seemed to be drawing me beneath its canopy,

and also, the closer I got to it, the faster my bike seemed to be speeding up; By itself!

Faster, and faster and faster until

I felt like I had been poured down an extremely steep mountain

And I couldn’t slow down.

Then jolted, as my bike climbed up on the bridge with a shudder of every bone in my body

Then shot off the other end just as fast

as if the bridge wanted to shoot me from its jaws like a cannon launches a ball from its grasp.

And try as I may; I still couldn’t seem to slow my bike down for a long time, even though I was off the bridge. It wasn’t until I had gotten off the bridge and a good ways into the woods that I was finally able to even slow my bike down to a manageable speed. I was relieved though, to be off that crazy bridge, and took the opportunity to pull my bike off to the side of the path for a moment and take a break from this madness, just to catch my breath and clear my head, and decide “how far”–I wanted to explore this little side road I had discovered.

It also wasn’t long, before I determined; I had no idea where I was.

It was peaceful enough now though, now that I could hear the sounds of the forest around me, the wind in the trees, crickets and what-knots scrounging around, birds in the distance, along with a stream, somewhere, gently making its way across some rocks…

My heart rate then finally returned to its normal pace, and in my attempts to recover from being somewhat blasted off that bridge; in my mind; I had almost decided to keep on going, just to not have to cross the bridge again to get back to where I had come from.

When in the distance, I thought I saw a deer.

It was kind of hard to make out because it had gotten a good bit darker, with all the trees covering the road, and it was beginning to get late.

But I was sure I saw something a little further down the road. I figured it was a deer, but a young one. It was too small to have horns, so I thought, I’d see if I could get a bit closer to it… just to check things out.

You know, deer are curious creatures too. That’s why they hang out sometimes beside roads; they’re just wanting to check out what’s going on. So, I thought I’d see if I could get a little closer to it for a better look.

But, as I walked closer to it, the farther into the woods it walked, it seemed to want to simply slip quietly back into the forest from whence it came. Which only made me, more curious and want to follow it into the woods.

Then, as I thought, I was at about to the point to where I was definitely about to truly frighten it off, it turned and stared at me through the thick woods, then, began running full speed back to the point on the road where I had first seen it, still a good distance from where I had made my way to;

Which kind of startled me.

And I then thought it might then decide to actually charge me,

So, I began to turn and run in defense,

When out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw a glimpse of sheer fabric dance across the road at the exact spot where I had first seen the deer.

I had already began to turn and run, and I wasn’t able to stop fast enough to turn back around and get a good look: but I was now sure, I wasn’t sure at all what I had seen—so I now ran full speed down the road to where the fabric had entered the trees to see if I could make out what had run into them.

My respiration rate was now as fast as I could make it, but it still wasn’t fast enough to keeping up with the energy I was exuding. And my heart rate, well the bridge hadn’t even begun to match this pace, so when I got to where, whatever it was, had ran into the forest; I had to stop for a moment to bend over, coughing and hacking—grabbing my knees to keep from falling down.

I didn’t see what it was that had ran off into the woods, at first, and all I could hear was my breath as it rushed in and out of my burning lungs and the water,–in the stream, that now seem to be rushing too at a slightly fast pace, as I stared at the ground, trying to maintain my  balance and not fall.

But try as I may, my breath was not coming back to me in a regular fashion.

It was as if someone had tied a belt around my chest and I just couldn’t take a deep breath. So, I forced myself to stand up erect; and when I did, just a little distance from where I was at, I definitely caught another glimpse of a gentle pale-sky-blue sheer fabric as it danced out of site into the forest.

I bent over again and grabbed my knees once more, and then with all my might, forced myself to stand erect as I could, only this time drawing in as much air in as I could, and began following the fabric into the woods.

It didn’t take but a few steps for my lungs to recover to the point that the burning subsided and almost at the same time, I again caught a glimpse of the dress.

Then after a few more steps, I saw it again, and a bare slender leg… and then I lost sight of it again.

But the water; it was becoming much louder now.

And I could only imagine, she! was headed for the water.

So, I headed straight for the sound

I couldn’t imagine her going anywhere else, because the sound of the river was now coming from directly in front of us, where I was now making no lost time in finding.

And the closer I got to the water, I could begin to see it through the trees in every direction; but I couldn’t see her anywhere. But I pressed on.

Until I came to a group of boulders I had to briefly climb up, that were preventing the waters from swamping the area I was approaching from

Then when crested, I saw her

in all her youngness
as she waded in the gently rolling waters that came up to just below her calves.

I couldn’t take my eyes off her

She was so beautiful

I still now can’t even begin to describe her beauty, and I tried and I tried to breathe again, but her beauty, now seemed to be sucking all the air from me, and I had great difficulty thinking of what to do…

And then; she beckoned me to join her in the stream

So, what did I do?

I did what any normal old-man like myself would do!

I reached in my pocket and fumbled around to pull out my phone to take a picture!

What? I said I was an Old-man.

But!!!

As I looked at the screen on my phone to frame the perfect shot?

She was gone!!

Of course, I quickly looked in every direction

But she was nowhere to be found!

I mean! What the Hell.

Where’d she go?

I mean she was right in front of me…

There’s no way she could move that fast…

And as I struggle to squint my eyes to see in which direction in the forest, she had run off in

Pow!

Like, an acorn or something hit me right in the middle of the forehead!

“Shit!!!”

(opps, sorry… 😊)

“Curse Word!”

And as I tried to open my eyes from immediately being closed:

Pow!!!

Another one! Same spot to; dead center of my forehead—between my eyes.

Damn-it!!!

So, this time when I opened my eyes, I of course lifted my arm up and tried to look over it, then under it

until I could make out, what was hitting me.

Then just on the other side of the stream,

damn little guy was throwing rocks at me, and starting to hit me all over the place

Well, shit: of course, I jumped behind the closes tree I could find only to hear him… then, them… laughing their asses off.

I mean? what the Hell?

Right! there wasn’t just one of them

There were three or four—or six or nine?

I couldn’t quite tell
because every time I tried to look from behind the tree, I was taking refuge behind

They’d pelt me again with one of the little rocks they would throw!

And, and; They were Green!

All ages too! And short, about two-foot-tall, at best.

Well, the older ones; they weren’t so interested in the “throwing-the-rocks” at the old man game as the younger ones were… but they were enjoying the whole affair, just the same, as they laughed and rolled in the grass, twirling their gold coins across their knuckles.

Yeah, that’s what they were throwing at me!

The young ones would roll their gold coins, back-and-forth, across their knuckles like a gambler does their poker chips sometimes, then they’d throw them up in the air, by flipping them somehow, which turned them into little rocks—then catching them in their palms—then whirl them at me with extreme accuracy, hitting me in every area of my body that protruded from behind the much to skinny tree I was attempting to squeeze behind.

Leg, shoulder, head, back… everything was fair game it seemed.

And the whole time, after each toss; laughter! Huge laughter! From each of them, sometimes alone, but often in unison as if everyone does when laughing when it becomes contagious, they couldn’t stop laughing, or throwing the gold coins—now stones at me.

Well I quickly decided that little tree was just that, too little, and I started running, back through the woods towards my bike: with them hitting me from time to time, just to keep me running; I bet.

I finally got back to the road, out of breath again of course; and didn’t believe I could hear them chasing me, although I did think I heard them laughing a couple of times—but, I’m also, not entirely sure of that…

What I am sure of though is, I didn’t see that girl in the shear dress again.

I have no idea where she ran off to, but she sure ran there fast.

But it was getting late, and dark, and a little cold too.

And I was getting really thirsty, it was also, way past my dinner time, so you guessed it; I was starving! as well. And, compounding it all—the running through the forest.

I knew I didn’t have anything to drink with me, but as I made my way back toward my bike, I remembered the candy bar I had stashed in my pocket from my bosses, earlier, when I got off…

Ah! Sweet Relief… Mounds!

“sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don’t. Almond Joys got nuts—Mounds don’t.”

The sweet coconut filling surrounded by Dark rich chocolate!

My mouth watered in anticipation of such things and I couldn’t tear into the package fast enough;

but as I lifted the goodness up to my lips, I got that unmistakable felling, something was crawling on my finger…

So, without even thinking about it, I quickly switched the candy bar to my other hand and attempted to flick the intruder to my delight off my finger. But, it didn’t want to come off. So, I rubbed it with my other fingers on that hand to loosen it, but it still wouldn’t come off—I must have killed it though, because it wasn’t crawling around anymore, but it did no use to loosen it so, I had to rub it off my finger on my pants; which still took a few attempts to get it off.

I did all this by simple reflex reactions to something crawling on my finger, not giving the whole affair much attention at all, because at that time I was mostly focusing on getting back to my bike, and not much else. When I then felt like something was now crawling on my other hand, the one that was now holding the candy bar…

Now it was about dark, but things could still be determined if you looked close enough: which I did, and then noted, there was not only coconut on inside of my Mounds, but there seemed to also—be a lot of coconut on the outside of this one…

Maggots!

They were all over the bar!

And all over my hand too!

Yuuuuuuuck!!!!!!!

I threw the bar in the bushes and began slinging my hand to get them off as fast as I could; but I slung one of them off, and it landed right on my face!

On my cheek!

You can only imagine the importance I gave to getting it off.

Then once I had, I bent over, to be sure I didn’t sling anymore on myself, and began the task of rubbing and ringing my hands together to get them off.

Yuck again.

Dead Maggot guts were now smeared all over my hands…

…so, I began rubbing my hands on my pant legs to get them off, then the thought of one of them surviving all this ordeal and crawling up my pant leg…

…so I rubbed a whole lot more, just to make sure that wouldn’t be a fear, but the sliminess of the critters just wouldn’t come off my hands, and now I had them smeared all over my pant legs too…

…when I noted some grass that was growing beside the dirt trail, and quickly thought to use the dew that was now forming on it to wash the slim off…

…but it seemed to only make the matter worse, so I had to rub them in the dirt a bit, then alternate that with rubbing them on the wet grass…

The matter took some doing, but I seemed to have gotten them off finally and stood myself, after being full on, down on my knees addressing this situation on the side of the road.

YUCK, YUCK, YUCK!!!

I just hate maggots, especially if I get them on me, they just crawl around and… it just makes my stomach turn.

But I had to be getting home.

And the thought now of having to stick my dirty hands in my motorcycle riding gloves for my bike… My bike!

I had forgotten all about being on my bike, and as I looked down the road to where I had parked it… I saw another, different: lovely lady… just standing beside my bike… just looking at it… paying no attention to me…

Ok? So, what’s a Lady, looking like that, in one of those short little red dresses… doing out in the middle of no-where; looking at my bike for?

Heels and everything? Cutest little Peter-Pan haircut, and oh-my-my…

“I just love the Blue color of it.”

“Yeah, I was kind of drawn to it when I found it, because of the color of it;” only to notice it was the exact color of her dress.

Wait a minute, didn’t she have a red dress on?

But as I spoke with her, I suddenly couldn’t focus on her dress now, because I became mesmerized by how perfect her lips were, and how perfectly her red lipstick complemented… just everything about her.

Oh shit!! Then suddenly noticing; rear tire, “well crap!” sticking out of it was the nastiest looking huge gnarly nail.

“Excuse me?”

“my tire.”

“Oh, my goodness!” “How did you do that?”

“I figure I picked up that nail there on that old covered bridge a ways back.”

“Oh! You came across that old bridge? That things been trying to fall for years.”

Ok, I know, I was just as amazed she spoke as you are. I mean, I’m always amazed when a being that beautiful speaks, it’s like, Wow! You can talk too!

We chit-chatted back and forth for a few more minutes when she invited me back to her house to see if there might be anything out in her garage to repair the tire with…

I figured, it was worth a shot, I’d left my tire repair kit at home, mistakenly—obviously, and she was so… beautiful.

“you live around here?”

“Yeah, just down that path there a little bit.” Turning and pointing behind us, across the street, on the opposite side of the road of the river.

I thanked her appropriately, for her hospitality, and began following her through the trees down the path as she led me forward.

It had been quite the afternoon, and I was glad to get the help. And as we walked along, I searched my memories for things to talk about, when she asked me how I had come to be in the area.

I told her about riding my bike to work, and getting off early, then finding the road we had been walking from and how I had come to stop, thinking I had seen a deer that turned out to be this girl I followed down to the river.

“Oh, did you meet her? I know her: she had asked me if I wanted to go down to the river today, but I wasn’t in the mood to go wading today.”

It didn’t surprise me they knew each other, for some reason. And she said she lived on the other side of the river in the next holler. Then I ask,

“anywhere near those Little Green Bastards?”

She laughed; and claimed no recollection of any little green men. She thought I was being silly, but I wasn’t! I thought, if I could just get my hands on those…

…but the low growing limbs and branches on the path were slapping me in the face and distracting me, and hanging up in my shirt, sometimes so bad they would almost spin me around when I got caught up good in them—I was wondering how she was managing not to get her long flowing chocolate brown hair all tangled up in them, when I saw her slip one of those elastic bands from her wrist and tie it up, which allowed it to swing freely back and forth across her back between her perfectly tan shoulder blades that were perfectly framed above the oh-so-tight red tube-top that gently dance just above her jeans that she must have painted on…

…wait-a-minute!, wasn’t she wearing a dress…

I digress, we shortly came to a little cleared area in the trees, with one of those mountain cabins, a little overgrown, I will admit, but she probably kept herself busy painting those pants on… then, I immediately remembered I was going to check in her garage for a flat tire kit,…

…when she asked, if I wanted something to drink, and then also remembering how thirsty I was, blurted out, “oh, yeah! That’d be great.”

“well, come on in, and I’ll see what I’ve got.”

The interior of the cabin was just what you’d expect for a log cabin: with the dark wood walls and forestry type stuff hanging on them; axes and chains/traps and stuff like that, but it was warm, with that big fire burning in the fireplace.

She indicated for me to sit down at the table, as she seemed to float around the cabin in her long black dress that gave her the appearance as if she wasn’t even touching the floor as she gathered up a cup and poured me some liquid from one of those old-timey-like brown jugs: I was just expecting water, but this stuff… pretty good…

She asked if I was hungry, but I insisted that I couldn’t impose like that, but she wasn’t hearing any of that and then got a bowl off one of the shelves and floated over to the caldron that was hanging over the fire, stirring the pot with the long handled ladle…

And as she dipped out a portion to put in my bowl, I could have sworn I saw a hand

grasping to the ladle from inside the pot

as if to keep it from being drawn out!

But as she lifted it higher to the bowl, there wasn’t an arm attached to it!, and it feel helplessly back in the pot, without even the slightest of a splash,

(I thought better, thought I was tired, I must be seeing thing.) as she placed the bowl before me on the table and turned, I assumed, to retrieve me a spoon.

it smelled amazing, so I leaned over the bowl to gain a better, see what-was-in-it that smelled so good,

and saw, two piercing-Blue-eyes

that were staring back at me from inside the bowl!

“Holly-Shit” I screamed, as I quickly pushed my chair back from the table

the chair’s back legs catching on the slat wood floor, pitching me on my back on the floor

startling her, causing her to then spin and hover directly over me

staring at me with her eyes that now looked like Yellow Fire Balls!

She had changed!

Her hair frizzed out in every direction

Her noise had grown four lengths

And there were long bristled hairs that needed cutting protruding from the huge mole that was on her chin.

I, of course was screaming, but I couldn’t hear myself

Because of the guttural sound, she was now releasing…

“WaaHa, Ha! Ha! Ha!”

I scrambled across the floor on my back to the door, then stood and searched it for the knob, but there wasn’t one.

And as I couldn’t find a knob, I decided to just grab the door by its edges and just pulled it from its hinges

throwing it across the cabin, then ran through the opening for the trees.

“WaaHa, Ha! Ha! Ha!”

It sounded like she was right behind me, but I just kept on running.

“WaaHa, Ha! Ha! Ha!” the sound now echoing off the trees, confusing me, but I just kept on running.

“WaaHa, Ha! Ha! Ha!” now her cry was coming from my left, but I kept running straight, back in the direction of my bike.

“WaaHa, Ha! Ha! Ha!!!!”

…BAM!!!

I had run face first into a very substantial tree; large enough to stop me dead in my tracks and caused me to fall just as hard backwards on my ass, laid out on the dirt path.

I was transfixed by the pain that now permeated my entire body as everything instantly stopped for a moment as I squirmed in the dirt trying to get away from the pain.

Of course I had my face in my hands, but I couldn’t touch it real good, it was really hurting, from my forehead to my chin, and my noise; I figured was broken, it was definitely bleeding, and I wasn’t real sure I wasn’t bleeding elsewhere too.

And there was a weird ringing in my ears, but I just couldn’t focus on it for the unrelenting pain I was feeling—everywhere, then as if to add insult to injury, the back of my head was also now starting to sting really bad where I had bounced it on the ground when I fell backwards…

Like I’m say’n, I’d of thought of my situation a little closer if I was in any kind of shape to have done so, but being as it was, I wasn’t even thinking of that Witch. She did come to mind after a good little bit, but I didn’t see her anywhere and I could hear her flying around either.

The light of the moon wasn’t helping out matters much either, because I couldn’t make out where I was, at all. So, after finally pulling myself off the ground, I thought of looking for the tree I had just ran into and see if I could determine which direction the road was from there.

Easily, Ha! I found the tree, it was right in the middle of the path, that I could make out, because beyond the path—the trees and brush were so dense you couldn’t pass through it at all, and kind of took that opportunity to just stand there and lean against the tree and again gather my myself.

Then, slowly, to be certain not to touch my face on any of the branches, I began making my way.

The afternoon had, to say the least, been wroth with discovery. Not too often one experiences such things, but as an adventurer; these and other things happen sometimes.

So, cautiously I made my steps purposely, knowing one more mishap could end me, and I discounted all as some—I don’t know, dream? It sure seemed like some stupid dream: seemed like one of those stupid stories you read for fun when you get caught up in them and then just wonder where and how the author is going to end the thing. But, the blood streaming out of my noise wasn’t a dream, as I spit and sputtered it off my upper lip, which also burned a good bit; it must have been cut as well.

So, there I was, walking through the woods by moon light, thinking what a bizarre chain of events had brought me this far, when I thought I saw a light just ahead.

It was. It was my headlight on my motorcycle. “oh, shit!” I thought. I must have left the key in it. “well, of all things—crap’ I hope it starts!

And just then, it did!

I picked up my pace a bit, thinking, I was too far from it to catch whoever was about to steal it, but hoped, that maybe I could get a glimpse of them for the insurance and police report.

Varoom! Varoom! I heard it rail out, as the big engine was coming alive.

They didn’t seem to be in any hurry to make their getaway: so, I picked up my chase a little more, wondering if maybe I could get to them before they pulled off. Trying, unsuccessfully to avoid the last few branches that slapped me in the face, bring excruciating pain with each blow.

Beep!

Beeeeeep!

Beep-Beep!

Beep-Beep! BEEEEEEEP! Beep-Beep!

I got to the road in a full out sprint. What kind of clown was this messin’ around with my bike?

All the bikes lights were on, flashers and all.

And the jerk was playing a kind of sick rhythmic tune of sorts with my bike:

Varoom! Beep-Beep! Varoom! Varoom! Beep-Beep!…

When I got to within about twenty yards from them, I saw…

It was those damn little green ones again!

I could just make them out as they danced as they laughed in front of the head light.

“Hey!”

I screamed as soon as I made them out.

But, it came out more like, “hey,…” as I was running full blast.

So, I bent down as I ran and scooped me up a hand full of dirt off the road, hoping there would be some rock in it and threw it at them.

Whether anything hit anyone or not, it got their attention, but they just burst out louder with their silly laughs.

“Ha! Ha!—Ha! Ha!!”

“If I get my hand on you! I’m going to start tearing off heads…” I shouted as I was almost upon them,

But, just as I was almost upon them;

Poof!… they vanished into the woods

Each in his own direction.

Ha! Ha!—Ha! Ha!!, they laughed, as their voices now faded into the distant woods.

Without any hesitation though, I quickly jumped on my bike,

Enough of this madness

I only wanted to get out of this insanity

I kicked the kick stand and shifted the bike in First,

Popping the clutch, spraying dirt and rock as I spun the back tire, which astoundingly seemed to not have lost any air,

spinning the bike around and heading it back towards the bridge.

The wind on my face; cool and crisp

As I progressed through the gears

Speeding faster and faster

As I navigated the soft turns of the dirt road.

I shouldn’t have been going so fast,

Being it was a loose dirt road,

But I just kept progressing

Not letting up a bit, despite the risk.

I didn’t care about experiencing anymore madness.

I soon saw the bridge ahead,

I beared down on the throttle

I couldn’t get there fast enough.

But the closer I got to it

They scarier it looked.

Weird, it looked.

I couldn’t tell from my angle

If I was going to shoot threw

its middle,

Or slam into the bridges side, or a railing

But not wanting to be detained

in this forest, any longer

I dropped the bike a gear

Then twisted the throttle to its limit

Maxing out the little bikes Acceleration

throwing all caution aside

But the closer I got to the bridge

the Darker it became

Then,

Happy Halloween

pops