The Vigil

A (Halloween) Short Story

Image courtesy of Michael Fousert via Unsplash. Edited using Canva.

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October 31st, 11:53 pm

It was probably just a stupid urban legend. The usual horror tropes with a local twist. Why would a ghost only appear at 11:59 on Halloween night? And where did she go for the rest of the year? Did she just hide out in the pond like some discount Lady of the Lake? Her description was about what you’d expect too. Girl in a long white dress. Could be anybody. Like a horoscope, it was written to be as broad as possible. So people could pretend it applied to them and only them. Ethan was smarter than that. He’d just finished teaching a unit on media literacy, after all. And yet here he was. Sitting on a park bench with a high powered flashlight, waiting for…what? Some shadow he could pretend was Ashley’s spirit? His daughter was gone. Gone for twenty three years as of tonight. But there was some part of him, however small, that wanted to believe.

11:54 pm

He should just go home. This was just embarrassing. What if one of his students saw him? But then, it was a student who had inadvertently sent him on this fool’s errand in the first place. Definitely inadvertent, although he had wondered. But Payton was too young to remember the media frenzy or everybody’s short-lived paranoia that their child might be next. Even his friends and family rarely talked about it anymore. She probably just found the story on Reddit or some other forum where teenagers try to scare each other.

No, he doubted anybody else would turn up. It was getting late, and there were better things to do on Halloween than wait around in the dark. Not that he’d had any plans for tonight. Most of his friends were probably in bed by now, even if it was a Friday. Just another sign they were all getting old. Maybe Deb was still up. She’d always been a night owl back when they were married. Of course, that was almost twenty years ago. They were both different people now.

11:55 pm

Damn it was getting chilly. Maybe he should have brought an actual coat, rather than this windbreaker thing he’d found at the back of the closet. It smelled musty. He’d probably wake up with a sore throat tomorrow from whatever mold was growing in the lining. Ethan hadn’t worn it in at least twenty years and wasn’t sure why he was wearing it now. So Ashley would recognize him? That was the only thing he could think of, and that didn’t make any sense either. Nothing could bring her back. He knew that already. Not the arrest, not the execution, and sure as hell not his sitting here in a dayglo green jacket from the mid-90’s.

it was a different time. Back when you could still let your kids roam the neighborhood without worrying about them. Even Deb had been fine with it. Ashley wasn’t alone, after all. Katie and McKenzie would be with her the whole time. At least, until they weren’t. The girls swore up and down that they didn’t ditch her on purpose, and he even believed them too. Even back then, he was pretty good at sussing out when a kid was lying. One of the perks of the profession. But how Ashley had gotten separated from the other kids was a lot more of a mystery than who’d nabbed her off the street.

11:56 pm

Dwayne Morse.

A junkie. A petty criminal whose previous crimes included selling weed across from the high school and stealing radios out of unlocked cars. Not your typical child killer, but the evidence was pretty clear. There was only one set of fingerprints found on her body, and the duct tape wrapped around her arms and legs perfectly matched the roll found in his car. The only thing missing was the weapon. Some kind of serrated blade, the coroner said. They never did find it. Morse swore to the end that he had just tied Ashley up and left her in the park for his accomplice; some woman who existed only in the depths of his imagination. The worst part was that he claimed he had no choice. She supposedly told him in a dream that it was ‘either his kid or somebody else’s.’ The drugs must have melted his brain if he thought anybody would believe that.

11:57 pm

This was beyond a nip in the air. It was a full on bite. Just two more minutes. Then he could give up and put the whole sorry episode behind him. If he’d known it would be this cold, he would have packed a hat and a scarf at the very least.

Cold spots.

That’s what they always talked about in those ghost-hunting shows. Not that he really watched them, but Deb always had them on in the background when he dropped by. She said she didn’t believe in ghosts, but she sure watched a lot of that stuff for an unbeliever. He’d half considered asking her along. In the end he decided against it, though. Chances were he’d be disappointed, and he couldn’t subject her to that too. Besides, she actually had things to do. She and Stan seemed happy enough, and she had two teenage sons to ferry around. It would be unfair to say she moved on. It wasn’t the kind of thing you moved on from, like a breakup or an argument. But she wasn’t where he was anymore. Deb was somewhere else. Further. Beyond.

11:58 pm

Just one minute to go—

What was that sound?

He scanned the flat and treeless grounds with his flashlight. Nothing. Nowhere even to hide. The pond itself was black and stagnant, and the reeds around it didn’t even twitch in the wind.

There it was again.

Somebody was crying. Softly, like they didn’t want to be overheard.

That’s how it always starts, the Reddit post said.

“Ashley?”

He didn’t mean to say it. The name slipped out of his mouth before he was even aware.

The crying stopped.

There was a pause that felt unending. Then a small voice, not even quite a whisper.

“Dad?”

It was her. Even from that one small syllable he could tell. He could barely think, barely even breathe.

“Oh my God. It really is you, isn’t it? This is real. This is really happening.”

“You can’t stay here. I’m sorry.”

She sounded different than he had expected. Her voice was still a child’s, but her tone was grave. World-weary.

“What do you mean?”

“There’s not much time. She’ll be coming soon.”

“Who? Who’s coming?”

“It doesn’t matter now. It always ends the same way.”

“Ashley, you don’t know how long I’ve waited just to hear your voice. Please. Just a moment more.”

“We can’t wait any longer. I’m sorry, Dad. She’s already—”

11:59 pm

That was when he heard it; the soft, fluid sound of something gliding through the water. Taking its time, as if it knew the outcome was inevitable. Ethan scrambled to his feet, dropping the flashlight in his panic. It rolled away, down towards the pond. He caught a glimpse of a hand, pale and skeletally thin. Then the light went out.

He couldn’t remember deciding to run. It was an animal instinct much stronger than his waking mind. Dingy streetlights beckoned from the distant parking lot, but here there was nothing but empty blackness. He moved blindly, stumbling on every uneven patch of grass and half-hidden sprinkler head. Several times he fell, but pure adrenaline forced him back on his feet once more. He didn’t know if he was being followed. It was hard to hear anything beyond his own ragged breathing.

The lights in the distance grew larger. He wasn’t far off now. There was his battered old Kia at the end of the parking lot. The only car left. A scream echoed across the park, high pitched and shrill. A child. His child. He tried to go back, to turn around, even just to stop, but something drove him onward in spite of himself.

What was wrong with him? Was he really so weak?

You can’t stay here.

Ashley.

He ran not of his own volition, but of hers. She had known this was coming because it had happened many, many times before. And she had tried to spare him.

November 1

A long time passed before Ethan finally turned the key in the ignition and drove away. Where to, he didn’t know, but he couldn’t go home just yet. Facing that dark, silent house was more than he could bear. He had never felt her absence as he did now, for she had been close, so close, before being snatched away again. What would have happened if he’d been able to stand his ground? Could he have saved her, or was her fate already decided two decades ago? He wasn’t a strong man or a particularly brave one, but he hadn’t even gotten to try.

Next year could be different. Next year he could do the right thing, whether she wanted him to or not. She didn’t understand what he owed to her. How could she when she had never had children of her own? He dashed the tears away with the back of his hand, but his eyes never wavered from the road. He needed time to think. Time to research and plan and prepare before he took up his vigil once more.