farmhouse gothic
farmhouse gothic by Karlie Hall first appeared in publication with Black Poppy Review.
The farmhouse had been empty for years when we moved in, the fields lying fallow and the fences sagging around them. My mother took one look at the dusty curtains and greasy stove and tightened her lips, already tying her hair up tightly under a scarf. She would make the best of it. It’s what we always did.
My sister and I explored while our father lay under the old tractor, tinkering with the engine. We worked, of course, helping turn the old farmhouse into something resembling home, but the afternoons were ours. We dipped our toes in the creek and whispered in low voices about the strangeness of this place, the hushed silence that followed our every move. Our mother put up new sunflower print curtains, only for us to find them hanging in shreds the next morning. Our old cat, Birdie, stood by the door like a sentry, yowling and screeching until our mother relented and let her out. She raced toward the edge of the farm with her tail straight in the air, running as though she were being chased by the demons of hell. We never did see her again.
And that was before my sister and I stumbled on the graveyard in the woods.
We were following the little creek, picking up polished stones as we went. She was carrying her shoes in one hand, barefoot in the squishy mud. I was behind her, focused on the garter snake I was tracking through the water, when she stopped short.
I looked up to find that the woods had dissolved into a small clearing, fireflies darting in and out of the safety of the trees’ shadows. I hadn’t realized how close to dark it was. Wasn’t it still early afternoon? The sun had been bright enough to make me squint just a few minutes earlier.
Hadn’t it?
We walked around the crumbling gravestones, brushing the cool green moss away to read the names of strangers. We called them back and forth in the hushed air, imagining their stories and their lives.
The moon was high by the time we made it back to the farmhouse, but when we stumbled inside the house, my mother burst into tears. She hadn’t slept in three days. My father was out looking for us.
Looking back, it seems that’s where the trouble started. But I don’t know for sure. It’s hard to remember.
All I know is we spent a few hours in an unknown graveyard filled with strangers and came home three days later, and I’ve been here ever since.
*
I plow the west field on Saturdays. Shifting the tractor into another gear, I wipe the sweat from my eyes and squint against the blinding sun. It will be dark before I make two rounds. But one day summer will end, and I need to have it ready to plant. Sometimes I wonder how many Saturdays I have devoted to this small strip of field, how many times I’ve dragged that boulder to the end of the woods, out of the way. I step off the tractor and bend over the weather-marked stone, twisting it out of the unforgiving earth and tossing it toward the trees.
I make exactly two rounds around the field before it’s too dark to see. The headlights don’t work. They’ve never worked. Inside the farmhouse I heat up the stew I made yesterday, sopping it up with the last of the bread. I’ve been on the last of the bread for a long time. Maybe tomorrow I’ll finally run out.
When I go to bed I have the same dream I have every night. Rippling water, a fairy ring of mushrooms, mossy gravestones with forbidden names. My sister’s—was she ever my sister?—the girl’s faint laughter. The feel of a polished stone beneath my fingertips.
Today is Sunday. I follow a creek into the woods. It may be the same creek the girl and I walked, or it may not be. It wasn’t there yesterday. A tiny snake ripples the water, and I bend down when something catches my eye. A shoe, the laces pristine and neat, the sole marked with barely-dried mud. My sister’s laughter echoes through the trees as fireflies spark to life.
The graveyard appears in the clearing before me as night falls over me, even though I began my walk under the morning sun only a few minutes ago. Behind me, the creek dries up, receding to leave only an unbroken tangle of underbrush and briars in its wake.
The names on the mossy gravestones are no longer strangers. I trace the names of my mother, my father, my sister, but I forget them as soon as my fingers fall away. At the end there is a stone with my name on it. The smell of raw earth and worms overwhelms me, then becomes me.
I stir as a chill runs through my bones. Footsteps on my grave. Two children, a boy and girl. Their laughter rings through the woods as they run their hands over the cool stone at my head. My own name, unfamiliar on their lips.
And so it begins again.
Karlie Hall is a middle school teacher who lives in Ellisville, MS. She holds a BA in English from the University of Southern Mississippi and is currently enrolled in the graduate program at William Carey University. She likes to read, bake experimentally, and landscape. Her work has previously appeared in several magazines, including Leading Edge, USM’s Product, Black Poppy Review, and Poppy Road.
