Taps in the Night

****Just to let y’all know. The first two stories in this ‘Taps in the Night’ and ‘The Hunt’ might seem familiar to some readers because they were entries I wrote for a writing competition last year. ****

Taps in the night

With quaking knees, shaking hands and a troubled mind, Elliot took in the sight before him. Upon first glance there was nothing here in the evening light that should terrify a person.

When eyes first gazed around this place they saw simply the ruins of an old stone church–now nothing but crumbling walls and broken pews that gave no hint as to how grand they may have once been. Dotted here and there upon the landscape of rocks, sand and sagebrush, were old stone grave markers–the names and dates so crudely scratched into their surface that it was now nearly impossible to identify the remains that lay beneath them.

Alabaster rocks, white and glittering in the setting sunlight stretched out as far as the eye could see to the west. Truly there was beauty here–an eerie, quiet type of beauty that could be appreciated in passing.

But Elliot was not here simply in passing. For he had made a very foolish decision–yet the only logical decision that his fourteen year old mind had seen fit to make.

When the other boys on the schoolyard dared you to do something, you simply had to do it. Especially if there were girls present to witness your cowardice should you say no. Elliot had never had many friends–he found himself an outcast because of his love of the written word. Oftentimes he could be found sitting beside the river beneath the trees simply reading instead of roughhousing with the other boys. If he could do this–if he could earn their respect–then the other boys might just stop laughing and jeering at his expense every day.

And so here Elliot was. A few boys had ridden him out here on the wagon and then left him to spend the night among the ruins, rocks and grave markers. They would come collect him in the morning and if he managed to stay the entire night without running for home, Sarah Beth Landon had agreed to share her first kiss with him behind the school house.

Elliot swallowed hard. It wouldn’t be so bad and would be well worth the prize he’d receive the next day! Respect from the other boys and a kiss from a pretty girl. He could do this. After all, this place was only stone and dirt and the dead souls buried beneath the ground could do him no harm–they were little more than dust after all this time. Yes, there were stories, legends and myths about terrible things that could occur here–things that were less than human that called this place home…

Elliot refused to believe all of that. If he believed that then the fear would overwhelm him. This was nothing but an old cemetery and a collapsing church–nothing more and nothing less.

Elliot found a section of broken pew beside a crumbling wall and sat himself down upon it. He lit the kerosene lamp he had brought along to combat the encroaching darkness and opened the book in his lap.

It was a favorite book of his and one that Elliot greatly loved losing himself inside of. He quickly forgot about his eerie surroundings and became completely immersed in the tales on those pages. It wasn’t until his stomach rumbled uncomfortably that he looked up from the written words and realized that hours had passed.

Darkness now surrounded the church ruins–pushing in on all sides and seeming to be taunting him and his smallness as he sat in the vast wide open prairie land among the graves of the dead.

Elliot forced his mind from his own surroundings and grabbed up the sack full of biscuits and jerked beef that he had swiped from his family’s cellar before rushing off to meet the boys from school.

Munching on them and sipping on the canteen of water strapped to his belt, Elliot gazed around him. The moon was an odd one tonight–glowing orange in the pitch black expanse of sky.

In the distance Elliot heard a loud yipping fill the night. Coyotes. He only hoped they wouldn’t come here.

His hands shaking and his stomach full, Elliot closed up the sack and once again returned his attention to his book. He moved the kerosene lantern closer to himself and struggled desperately to forget that he was in these abandoned ruins, among all these graves, in a place rumored to be haunted, all alone after dark.

A tapping sound soon drew his attention once again away from the pages and he scanned the night as his heart raced.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Elliot peered into the darkness, wondering what was tapping–the sound seemed to be coming from those piles of white alabaster stones.

“Is someone there?” he called out, his voice trembling in the night.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

It seemed louder now and closer too. Elliot leapt to his feet, dropping his book to the ground and holding his lantern high. “Who’s out there?!” he demanded.

‘Who! Who! Who!’

Elliot let out a yelp of fear as he whirled around and then cursed himself for being a coward. It was nothing but an owl perched upon the crumbled wall. Yellow eyes stared at him intently and caused a shiver to wash over his spine.

A kiss from a pretty girl and respect from the other boys–that’s why he was doing this. He simply had to get control of his imagination! It had always been overactive and the source of countless headaches for his parents.

Stooping low, Elliot rescued his book from the dirt and settled himself once again upon the broken pew. He couldn’t seem to focus on his book, however, because his nerves were on edge, his heart beating a little too quickly and his skin slicking with a nervous sweat.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

That damnable tapping once again filled the night, louder and more clear than it had ever been before. Elliot leapt to his feet! Surely someone was playing a trick on him! He held his lantern high and scanned the night.

‘Who! Who! Who!’

Elliot swallowed hard and leapt around to see that owl still perched and staring at him. Its golden eyes stared deep into his and Elliot felt sweat drip beneath his shirt collar. His mouth seemed to go dry and it became hard to breathe.

The night was oppressive around him. Taunting. Teasing.

That tapping began again, sounding as if it was just at his feet and before Elliot could cry out or jump away, the owl unfurled its massive wings and leapt from its perch with a screech that deafened him.

Elliot dove for the ground to dodge the talons and beating wings that had been coming for his face. He flipped onto his back and watched the bird of prey soar off into the night, illuminated by the orange moon.

The light from the moon was now the only light filling the night. The lantern had shattered and died upon the ground. Tears filled Elliot’s eyes when that tapping once again filled his ears.

Home. Home. Home. He wanted to go home.

Elliot leapt to his feet and ran.

Panic and fear welled up inside him when he became surrounded by those tapping sounds! Yipping filled the night as well and the hooting of the owl seemed to resonate in his mind.

It was as if the night were laughing at him!

Darkness pressed in heavier around him and Elliot still ran on. His shirt tangled up on a sagebrush and Elliot fell down hard upon the rocky ground.

He curled into a ball and cried as the tapping sounded on all sides of him and that hooting owl swooped low, smacking his head with its great wings.

Then suddenly the night fell silent and still.

With a giant sniffle, Elliot raised his head warily and glanced around him. The owl was gone. The tapping had ceased. Elliot was completely alone in nothing but darkness and silence with only that glowing orange moon for guidance.

He stood slowly, wincing at the pain in his scuffed up knees and palms. Elliot clutched his book tightly, thankful that he hadn’t lost it in his fright. He was going to limp toward the road that would lead back to town when something crunched beneath his foot.

With a frown Elliot glanced down and his entire body began to tremble and shake.

Staring back up at him were the lifeless, empty eye sockets of a soulless, powdery skull.

An alabaster skull.

Tearing his eyes from that horrendous sight, Elliot found his eyes scanning the ground and the sight he was met with only caused his fear to grow, his panic to increase and his heart to thunder more violently.

All those beautifully eerie alabaster stones were gone and in their place lay the skeletal remains of hundreds of bodies!

It was as if the graves had been turned inside out and the bodies were now enjoying the glow of the orange moon. Elliot felt fear in its purest and truest form.

So many bodies surrounded him. So many empty eye sockets stared at him–mocking his fear.

Elliot’s entire body was trembling as he tried to find his way out of the maze of bodies. Everywhere he stepped, his boots crunched against bone and left him sobbing and gasping for breath.

Elliot! Elliot! Elliot!

Moaning voices filled the night lonesome groans that seemed to be calling his name. Elliot saw the shadows all around. Figures in the night coming for him. Black as tar against the black night–contrasting somehow in the glow of the moon.

Terror overwhelmed Elliot.

He lost all sense of reason and reality.

Those figures were coming for him as he stumbled and tripped over the alabaster remains of the deceased.

Elliot ran for the remains of the church. Churches were protected and holy places! If he could only reach them then he would be okay…

The figures closed in, looming over him as he struggled to reach safety through the bones that seemed to reach for him and become tangled beneath his feet.

Tears soaked his cheeks, his chest hurt, his mind was blank to anything other than fear and desperation as he clutched at his book and simply ran.

Elliot leaped through the air and jumped, coming down with a crash among the broken pews.

Safe.

He should be safe.

But he wasn’t…

Those figures loomed closer. They were black silhouettes with no faces but with bright red eyes that shone out of the darkness. Eyes that seemed to burn with the fire of Hell itself.

“Leave me alone!” Elliot screamed.

The figures laughed, pressing in on him from all sides. Hundreds of them. Oppressive, mocking and sinister.

Elliot sobbed. It was hard to breathe and his chest hurt. He wanted his mommy. He wanted to go home!

“Please.. Leave me alone,” he pleaded brokenly.

One of the figures reached out revealing a hand that was nothing but alabaster bone. A finger crooked toward him and a low chuckle filled the night.

“You are ours now.”

Elliot let out a final scream of desperation before the figures descended and darkness was all he knew.

---

“I wonder if he made it all night,” Creed Lucas wondered as he and Ethan Thomas walked toward the abandoned church and graveyard that they had left Elliot in the night before.

“I wonder how many times he pissed his pants,” Ethan snickered.

Creed didn’t care if Elliot had soiled his trousers or not–if he had managed to stay in that haunted, terrifying place for an entire night without running home then he’d have earned Creed’s respect for the rest of his life. There was no way on God’s green earth that Creed would have agreed to do such a thing!

He’d heard the stories about the voices and the shadows…. He’d heard about the disappearances associated with that place. He never would have had the courage to agree to a night there alone the way Elliot had.

The alabaster stones and crumbling rock walls came into view and Creed’s eyes scanned the landscape for any sign of Elliot but he didn’t see him.

“I think the coward ran home!” Ethan muttered.

Creed frowned, a prickling of unease washing over his spine. “Or he disappeared.”

“Oh come on! Those are just stories!”

Creed remained silent but in his mind he wasn’t so sure. Where was Elliot?

The boys walked to the stone ruins and began to look around them. They parted ways so they could search the ruins more efficiently.

“Elliot?” Creed called out.

He rounded a corner and the sight he was met with had him screaming and stumbling backward. Ethan came running around the corner as well and cursed as he grabbed Creed’s arm and tugged him backward.

“Let’s get the hell out of here, Creed!”

“We can’t just leave him like that!” Creed countered.

Ethan shook his head as his brown eyes shone with fear. “They’ll blame us for this!”

Creed knew that Ethan was right. They’d get blamed. The hoot of an owl sounded nearby and Creed nodded. “Let’s go!”

The two boys ran away as quickly as their legs could carry them across the dusty ground but Creed knew he would forever be haunted by what he had seen.

He knew that every time he closed his eyes he would see Elliot huddled there against the pew. He would see those lifeless blue eyes and that silent scream forever etched upon the dead boy’s face as he clutched the book he had always carried to his chest.

The Hunt

Oklahoma

1881

Boredom had long since settled into my young bones as I sat upon the ridge and watched the tranquil green valley below. The sun, which had been high in the sky when I’d started my silent vigil, was now threatening to dip below the horizon to the west.

I dreaded making the long trek home, not only because it would be a long trip on foot in the dark but also because I would be forced to admit to my mother and father that my hunting trip had been unsuccessful. Lord knew we needed food in the worst way. My fourteen year old body was much ganglier than the other boys at school and my mother was busy everyday taking in the extra fabric on all our clothes. Not only that, but my father wasn’t well enough to hunt and my sister, who had been born with weak lungs, was getting worse by the day as her body grew tired and weary from hunger.

As if to mock me, a gnawing ache rumbled to life in my middle and I mused that it sounded as if I’d swallowed a live wildcat which was now roaring and hissing to let me know it needed out.

I waved my hand to knock away a pesky mosquito and began to realize as the light continued to fade, that failure was indeed what my family would be having for supper again this week.

I could wait only ten more minutes and then I would have to leave. To pass the time I began to hum a song we’d learned in school the month before. It was a quick and happy little ditty that the girls loved to dance to.

So engrossed was I in thoughts of school and making sure I got every note of the song correct, that I nearly missed the movement in the valley below.

Quickly I scrambled for the binoculars and took a gander at what was finally making its way through the lush green grass. Disappointment filled me when I realized it was only a man. A man in a silly little felt top hat riding upon a donkey of all things!

Never had I seen a single thing so queer in all my life! He had a piece of prairie grass hanging off his lip and a small prod in his hand which he swatted the donkey with now and then to keep the small beast moving forward.

Now my boredom got the best of me and I decided to simply sight the man in with my rifle. I had no interest in shooting him of course but I wanted to see just how small he would look in my rifle sights.

I brought the Winchester repeater up to my shoulder, ignoring that rumbling in my middle and the dizziness the hunger was causing in my head, and I aimed at the man as he rode along.

I kept him in my sights for quite a while as he rode closer and closer toward the ridge on the trail that would lead him straight past me twenty feet above him.

When my stomach roared yet again, I decided it was time to go home and I was just about to lower the rifle, of that I was sure, when suddenly it filled the evening with a terrible bang and a bullet tore out the front of the barrel, pierced the peaceful evening air and slammed directly into the silly man’s chest.

My heart ceased to beat. Disbelief filled my mind and guilt tore through my senses.

The man tumbled from his saddle without so much as a word or a cry of pain or surprise and he fell dead upon the ground. His donkey let out a bellow and ran several feet before stopping and lowering his head to graze on the long grasses as if nothing at all out of place had happened.

I couldn’t seem to draw a breath. Gasping and panting I stared down at the lifeless corpse upon the ground so far below me.

I had just killed a man. A perfectly innocent man who had simply been going about his day just the same as I had been going about mine.

The next thing I knew I was running. Running away and running fast. I tossed my gun into the weeds and let my legs carry me quickly away from what I had done. I ran until my side cramped and my lungs burned. I ran until I reached the mud pits of the abandoned mine and I didn’t stop running until dizziness from hunger and lack of air had my head swimming and pounding. I slipped on the slick mud before falling down hard upon the ground.

My clothes, hair and body thoroughly coated in the thick gray clay and mud, I curled up in the sticky grime beneath an outcropping of rocks, pulled my knees into my chest and wept. Fat tears of guilt, fear and pain ran down my cheeks. I could not believe what I had done.

My mother would be heart broken and my father would be outraged. The disappointment they would both no doubt feel for me had me trembling. My baby sister would live the rest of her short life carrying the shame of knowing that her older brother had been a murderer.

Unless….

There was always the choice of simply leaving the man’s body out here for the critters and elements to dispose of. There had been no one else out here to know that I had been the one to take his life should his body be found. There were no witnesses and we were far enough from any homesteads to ensure that no one would have heard the shot I’d fired from my rifle.

Yes. That’s what I would do. I would simply ride home, tell my family my hunt had been unsuccessful, deal with their disappointment and crawl into my bed with nothing but a bit of turnip soup in my belly and that constant gnawing ache of hunger I’d come to think of as normal.

Then, as if sent from above, a sudden thought entered my mind and I shook my head roughly at the absurdity of it and wondered why in the world it had suddenly appeared. There was no way I could do that!

But I was so hungry…

My stomach clenched as if to remind me that it had been weeks since we’d had more than the most meager of meals–and as if to emphasize that fact even further, my vision swam and I had to sit there and breathe deeply for several long moments before I felt steady enough to open my eyes.

Nibbling at my lip, I suddenly wondered if I could do it. It would solve all my problems. There would be no body to be found as well as full stomachs for not only me but for my mother, father and sister as well.

Inside I swelled with pride and beamed with joy at my cleverness. There was no point feeling guilty over what I was about to do. I had already killed the man and could see no good in letting his terrible death go to waste.

With determination now replacing the fear and guilt I’d been consumed with, I pushed myself to my weary feet. Slipping and sliding with every step, I made my way out of the mud pit and headed back toward the valley, grabbing my discarded Winchester rifle from the brush on my way.

The first thing I did after reaching the valley was build up a small campfire beside the carcass so I could see to work since darkness was beginning to settle over the land. Next, I stripped the body of clothing and laid it out across them to protect the meat from dirt.

Skinning the meat would have been easier at home, tied up on the porch but I knew that wasn’t an option. Not only would carrying the entire body the miles between here and the cabin be extremely difficult, I doubted my family would be as impressed with my hunting skill should they see the game I’d taken.

No, cleaning the meat would simply have to be done the hard way. I wasn’t bothered by doing things the hard way. I was a hard worker and my family was going to be so proud to see me riding in with so much fresh meat!

My knife was good and sharp, a thing which my father had always lectured me on, and it sliced through the pale skin easily as I began to strip the carcass of its outer layer. Twice I had to pause to wipe the sweat away but never did I stop completely.

Next came cutting the meat from the bone. I spread out my bedroll that I had brought along just in case my trip took all night and very carefully, as not to ruin any food, I trimmed the meat from the bones and laid it on that blanket. I cut even the smallest slivers, knowing that my mama would be able to use them for stew.

After wrapping up the meat, I realized I now had a dilemma. There was the leftover skin, skeleton and clothing of this man laying out here for anyone to see–as well as his donkey.

There was only one thing I could do… Slipping through the dark I made my way back to the abandoned mining camps. Without much difficulty and without wasting much time, I found a shovel amongst the timbers. When I returned to my fire a short time later, I began to dig a hole.

Sweat trickled down my thin back and soaked into my cinched trousers from the amount of work I was being forced to accomplish but I knew it would be worth it to see my family finally enjoying a good meal. We had been far too long without.

Once the evidence of my kill–including the man’s belongings off the donkey–were hidden below the ground. I swatted the donkey roughly and sent it running away across the plains.

Deciding it would be best to sleep until morning and then head back to the cabin, I curled up beside the little fire and let sleep claim me–my dreams full of the sights, scents and tastes of fresh roasts, sizzling meat and filling stews.

The next morning, I left my camp with the dawning sun. I walked toward my family’s cabin with my catch tied to my back and after several hours the smoke from the chimney came into view.

“Did you get something, son?” my papa asked with a broad, happy grin when he saw the bulging pack on my back and sat his cutting axe aside.

I knew I would be beaming with pride. “I sure did, pa! I got us enough meat to last a few weeks.”

“That’s great, Alexander!” he ruffled my dark hair and whistled loudly, bringing my mama and sister out of the cabin to see what was the cause of the commotion. My sister, Sarah, hobbled over on her weak legs, her breathing labored as her crippled lungs struggled to draw in enough breath.

“Do we get a real supper today?” she whispered, hope shining brightly in her green eyes.

“We sure do, Sarah.” I was proud to tell her.

“Oh, Alexander!” My mama had tears shining in her brown eyes as she hugged me tight and kissed my cheek. “You are such a good boy! I knew we could count on you.”

“It was nothing, mama, really. Easiest game I ever have hunted,” I admitted honestly as my cheeks reddened from receiving such adoration.

I couldn’t remember ever having a better day than that one. My family was so pleased and proud that they spent the entire day boasting about my success and pampering me while insisting I allow them to do my chores since I’d worked so hard at getting meat.

That night, as we feasted upon the delicious roast my mama had prepared, I couldn’t help but think about how easy the hunt had been, how nice the attention was and how I couldn’t wait to go out hunting and bring home a sack full of meat once again.