Once upon a time, there was a perfectly
ordinary family who led perfectly ordinary lives as peasant farmers in the perfectly
ordinary Middle Ages somewhere in perfectly ordinary Europe. Unfortunately for them, they chose to set up
farm at the edge of an extremely haunted forest that did not appreciate a human
family unit coming along, clear-cutting the woods and introducing their
domesticated animals into the previously balanced environment, decreasing
property values everywhere. So
naturally, the haunted forest swore revenge upon the perfectly ordinary family and decided to drive them insane as its method.
The haunted forest
started off slowly to prolong the suspense: disappearing linens here, cow’s
milk going sour there, sudden blights upon the crops, random screams in the
night, and not a single witch in the area to blame it on. However, to the haunted forest’s chagrin, the
perfectly ordinary family was also a perfectly optimistic family, constantly
turning to their faith that things would get better if they just kept at it and
did not despair. This type of thinking
only drove the haunted forest bonkers, so it decided to kick things up a
notch. Soon there were blood-red moon
sightings, birds acting all kinds of crazy, the 10 perfectly ordinary children
walking into the haunted forest and back out again without gathering a single
stick of firewood, and Poppa having an unheard-of-for-its-era mid-life
crisis. Momma prayed for deliverance as
Poppa neglected the fields yet again for something he called,
when he was speaking in tongues, “a round of golf,” but her prayers seemed
unanswered, as they always seem to be in these situations. So, Momma decided to get proactive.
Grinding her teeth as
the morning gruel sprouted weeds for the fifth time, she herded her 10 children
into the main room of their one-room abode and locked them in: she did not care
what they or any possible poltergeists destroyed, as long as nobody went
wandering off to be taken by the haunted forest.
Next, she tracked down Poppa lounging in a cloth that he had tied to two
trees and called what sounded like “ham uck,” and she debated leaving him there
but eventually could not, in good conscience.
Instead, she lured him back to the house with promises of something he
called “the big game” and she locked him in there with the perfectly ordinary children
and the possible poltergeists so they could all stare at each other with
nothing to do.
Momma then entered the
haunted forest, but since there was no official trail head or even human-made
trails she used a scythe to cut her way through the brush, knowing that she
was angering the haunted forest even more and that she could not care any less
than she did at that moment. She had no
idea where to go or what to do when she got there, but she assumed that the
haunted forest would be in touch with her shortly.
Sure enough, she
reached a clearing that seemed the perfect place for her to state her case.
She opened with:
“Leave me and my perfectly ordinary family alone, you gits!”
An ethereal voice
answered: “Leave… first…and… you’ve got… yourself… a deal....”
“Never!” She retorted.
“Lord ---- gave us that land to farm for him, and we are farming it,
will ye or nill ye!”
“Lord ----… is… a
dastard....” the haunted forest stated.
“We… do not recognize… his authority....”
Momma was working on a
months-long headache, so she offered: “All right, if we ask him to move our
farm farther away from you – not that far, mind, but far enough – would you then
cease all the curses and wicked behavior and whatever else on my family?”
Momma had to wait a
few moments for a response: “That… sounds reasonable....”
“Done! We move over a bit, you leave us alone
forever, `tis a deal, binding for eternity, I will tell the others,
farewell!” Momma yelled over her
shoulder as she ran out of the confused haunted forest.
Over the next several
weeks, the perfectly ordinary family’s farm was relocated from the haunted
forest’s edge and reassembled in the middle of a meadow: not ideal, but they no
longer suffered the ongoing torments of talking chickens and Poppa racing his horse
and plow at all hours of the night. The
haunted forest slowly regrew the woods that had been lost, and all was well –
that is, until Lord ---- decided on a whim to build a new castle in the middle
of the haunted forest. But that’s
another story....
Oblivia
looked at her watch: “Would you look at the time, it’s 7:30 in the morning, I
completely talked the night away, I’m sorry guys!” She felt a big guilty for monopolizing the
party.
“7:30
a.m.?” One of the vampires said, then
opened the window shades and screamed at the early morning sunlight peeking
through. He and his compatriots
transformed into bats and flapped away.
“Wait,
what happened to Lord ----?” Dr.
Frankenstein asked; he was sitting cross-legged on the floor and was clutching
one of his skeletons as he leaned forward.
“That’d
have to be told at another time, I’m afraid,” Oblivia said as she stood to
stretch out the kinks; the remaining listeners groaned in disappointment. “Maybe next year?” She suggested.
A
mummy stood. “Seeing as we were going to
destroy you for crashing our party last night, it’d be great if you came here
next year, we’d love to have you again!”
“Aw,
thanks!” Oblivia was touched by their
acceptance of her, and gladly took the goodie bag they gave her on the way out.
She
emerged into the dawn of the First of November and skipped all the way home,
still wearing her Creepy Clown With Creepy Child costume and freaking out only some
of her neighbors. She thought back on
all the new friends she had made last night and the meaningful connection that
they had shared.
Halloween’s
the best, she thought. It’s the one day
in the year you can be anybody you want to be, and have a great time with some
awesome ghouls.
