It was Ina’s idea to camp out in the old Reynold’s place. Local legend was that it was haunted but Ina didn’t believe in “that old hoo-doo” and who were we to challenge Ina?
We all jumped in her little old Chevelle and peeled out, spitting gravel and scattering rabbits, screeching to a stop just inside the old split-rail fence circling the front yard. JJ and Russell pulled the ice chest out of the trunk while Ina and I lugged the sleeping bags onto the porch.
The sun was slipping below the tree-line as we spread a quilt over the dusty floor in front of the fireplace, looking eerily like a toothless mouth in a yawn, and pulled beers out of the cooler. We sipped and talked until we couldn’t see each other then we lit the Coleman lantern and a few candles. Russell pulled out a joint. We smoked and talked and ate snacks, our shadows large on the peeling walls exaggerating our every move.
JJ had gotten noticeably quiet, her eyes big and luminous like they get when she’s scared.
“What’s up, JJ?” I asked.
She dragged her eyes toward me and said in a solemn voice, “I see them waiting.”
Goosebumps shimmied up my arms. JJ had a gift, the second sight. We all looked at each other with eyes popped open like Wile E. Coyote falling over a cliff, our shadows wavering in the candlelight, ears straining. The effects of the weed were beginning to turn us from mellow to paranoid.
“Cut out that hoo-doo shit!” yelled Ina. JJ just looked at her, eyes unblinking.
The novelty of camping out in the old place was wearing off quickly. Even Ina paid attention when JJ said, “I know what I know”.
She jumped up, “Let’s go to town!”
We piled in the car and hauled ass. It was quiet as church. We were deep in the country and the trees were so thick they made a tomb of the road and us on it. The only light as far as we could see were the headlights from our car. The dark swallowed light like the whale swallowed Jonah and I was afraid it wouldn’t spit us out.
Ina flipped on the radio and some country guy was wailing about drinking beer and chasing women. A stinky trickle was snaking down my ribs while a sour burn grew in my belly from all the beer I’d drunk, the music and the smell of everyone’s fear pressing in on me like a shroud.
Suddenly, the car stopped. It just stopped, the lack of engine noise like a crack of thunder. Only not. The headlights started to dim as the night pressed closer but inside wild flames were leaping from JJ’s hair and eyes.
“I know what I know.” she whispered
Charlotte Hamrick is a New Orleans writer whose work appears in a number of literary journals and is included in Best Small Fictions 2022 and 2023. Her Fiction, CNF, and Poetry has been nominated, short-listed, and long-listed for literary things multiple times. She is Managing Editor for Reckon Review. Additional information can be found at https://linktr.ee/charlottehamrick.