Appleton at Dawn

A teenage girl and her two little brothers visit their great-grandfather's lake cabin as a frigid winter sets in. Tales abound in the village of what can be found in the fog... and what can find you.

     Bundled in our overcoats, we huddled stock-still on the planks of the weather-worn ferry. The enveloping fog kept me, the youngest of the three, in a dreamlike state from which I'd never roused myself since my last fitful sleep, the result of us three telling ghost stories the previous night in the sleeping train car. Mary, she was the oldest (all of 15 and even starting to drive!) had enthralled us with her tale of the young man who was stalked by the ghost of a beautiful woman. Every time he turned around or lowered his guard, there she was! And Will was only about a year older than me, so his 10-year-old story always had something to do with outer-space and usually didn't have an ending until Mary broke in with frustrated tones and finished it up for him, and he was content with that. I was only 9, and I hadn't quite grasped the idea that a person should tell a different story every time, or any time, and so even though I was always in the same company, I always told the same story that was perfectly thrilling to me, something about a red bicycle, and in the ending that bicycle meant something deep and powerful, even symbolic (though I could never say for what), to my 9-year-old mind, though my fellow tale-tellers were less impressed.

     On that slowly-swaying ferry, in my dreamlike state, I could scarcely tell when my eyes were opened and filled with the white fog, or closed and filled with the black void. Whichever was the case at any time, I couldn't rely on my eyes, but I heard four distinct sounds instead informing me of what filled the scene around me. Lightest of all, the crisp, thin film of ice over Priest Lake being methodically chipped and shoved aside by the ferryboat's lumbering hull. Then the groaning and moaning of the fog-soaked planks beneath our trembling boots. Third, a monotonous humming of some half-forgotten sea-shanty murmured from the twitching lips of our grizzled and gray ferryman at the helm above and behind us. And most clearly I heard our own shivering breaths, seemingly the only stirring in the silent, windless morning air.

     That it was morning I knew only because it had been night. That it was cold I knew, for the train car had been warm and comforting. Hours before we had sped like a bullet down metal rails and now we seemingly floated like driftwood, aimlessly and at a glacier's pace along the frozen face of Priest Lake.

     A sudden odor of chimney smoke induced me to open my eyes, and suddenly, as if by enchantment, a pier was jutting out in front of us into the frozen lake, and my sister was pushing Will and I towards it, eager to disembark.

     A brightly painted red and silver sign proclaimed the Appleton Inn, where we hustled through double doors after trudging a half-block from the pier. So this was Appleton after all. In one of my dreams I had been sure that the humming ferryman had played us a cruel joke by stranding us on a beast-filled island where only my nine-year-old cleverness would be able to bring us to safety. 

     Instead my resourcefulness slept while Mary spoke with a large, beaming lady, the keeper of the inn. A bit of true enchantment must have finally overcome me, for I very suddenly found myself in dry pajamas and between soft sheets, and wooden shutters closed out the cold morning sun and the shutters to the windows of my soul softly swung-to as well.

Reviews

[TheRavensWoods]

I am so enthralled by this story! I desperately want to read more. Your writing style is perfect, I felt as if I was reading a published mystery novel. Amazing job! I can’t wait to read more from you!

[Joel Crow]

Thank you so much. I'm glad you enjoyed it. I'll hopefully have more chapters soon.