Photo by Michal Ico on Unsplash
Skylar yanked at her jeans as she laid on the hood of Brian’s car. Yellow panties peeked above denim. An open can of beer tipped against the windshield. Her fingers squeezed the aluminum as she raised it to her lips. The stars reflecting in her eyes.
The crescent moon disappeared behind the water tower ascending from the roof of the abandoned mill. The shadow of the rusted tower stretched across the lone car in the gravel lot. The smell of cheap beer caught the wind and carried to the edge of the trees.
Brian crouched between the headlights, searching the ground for suitable rocks. Without standing, he hurled one at an already cracked window beside the mill’s padlocked metal doors. It ricocheted off crumbling brick. He tried again, this time striking glass and causing the crack in the lower pane to expand before splintering into shards.
Brian stood with a handful of pebbles. He watched Skylar pull down her shirt. His eyes locking on exposed skin.
“Do you think we should be heading back?” she asked.
“It’s not that late.”
“I guess not,” Skylar said, sitting up and resting her back against the windshield. She looked at her painted toes as her legs stretched out across the hood. “Do you think we should start using them?”
Brian tossed a rock into the air and caught it. “Start using what?”
“You know. I mean, just to be safe.”
“You worry too much.”
Skylar finished the beer and discarded it on the ground next to the tires. “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to. Don’t be mad.”
Brian rolled his eyes, turning his attention from Skylar back to the mill. “I’m not.”
Skylar put both hands on her stomach and pushed. She let her shoulders rise and her chest expand. “Do you think I’m fat? Should I go on a diet?”
“Are you serious?”
“I was just checking.”
“You know they say there’s a ghost in the mill,” Brian said, moving closer to the abandoned building.
“I don’t believe in stuff like that.”
Brian scanned the windows. “They say he’s an old mill worker who died in one of the machines.”
“How do you die in one of the machines?”
“I guess you get crushed, or something. I don’t know. I just know that’s what the guys at the firehall say.”
“What did they make here?”
Brian opened his hand and let the pebbles fall to the ground. He kicked at them with his shoe. “I’m not sure. It’s been closed a long time.”
Skylar pushed herself up and stood on the hood. Her bare feet balancing on the curves. A case of beer rested on the roof; cardboard ripped to shreds. “Do you want another?”
“Yeah,” Brian muttered, focusing on the only window not cracked or broken.
The glass seemed to contort and reveal a myriad of colors as he tilted his head. Through the bubbled pane, Brian half expected to see a specter.
Skylar grabbed two cans and stomped her foot when Brian didn’t turn around. “Earth to Brian.”
Two yellow socks laid on the ground under the bumper. Brian picked them up. “Yeah, sorry, Hey, don’t forget these.”
Skylar hopped down, holding both cans. “I won’t,” she said, handing Brian a beer and taking the socks.
She wrapped her arms around him. Her lips parted and their tongues touched. A crackling sound came from the abandoned mill. Pulling away, they looked at the mammoth structure.
“This place is so creepy,” Skylar said.
“Do you think that was the ghost?”
“It’s probably a raccoon, or something.”
“I dunno,” Brian said, focusing his attention on the pristine window hoping to see a shadow pass by.
“What’s the deal with that window? How come you never throw any rocks at it?”
Brian didn’t open the beer. Instead, he set it down on the hood. “I mean, take a look. The glass must have some grease on it, or something. Do you see how it changes colors when the light hits it?”
Skylar looked at the window, unimpressed. “I guess.”
“Don’t you see it?”
“Maybe a little.”
“It’s like looking at a Rembrandt, or something.”
“A what?”
“You know, like a painting.”
“Okay, sure. Are you going to drink that?” Skylar asked, looking at the unopened can perspiring on the hood.
That gave Brian an idea. His eyes flicked from the can of the beer to the mill. “Do you think I should leave it by the door?”
Skylar took a drink and leaned into Brian. “Why would you do that?”
Brian shrugged. “I mean, I’m sure he probably went to the bar after his shift ended. Maybe he’d like a drink.”
Skylar kissed his cheek and nudged him gently. “Oh, come on. You can’t be serious.”
“Sure, why not? There used to be a bar across the street.”
“Really?”
Brian pointed off in the distance at the rusted gate and steel posts that once supported chain link fencing. The low luminance of the cracked streetlight cast a halo above an abandoned gas station across the narrow road. Beside the gas station, almost entirely engulfed by the darkness, stood a shotgun shack.
“It was right over there. What if that’s where he drank after work?” Brian asked, letting his imagination run wild with the possibility.
“Does this ghost have a name?”
“Not that I know of.”
“How do you even know someone died in there? It’s probably just a legend.”
Brian picked up the unopened can and placed it on the slab of pavement in front of the chained double doors. “You never know. It could be true.” He pulled at the padlock. “I wonder if I can get in.” He looked at Skylar who seemed more interested in her nails. After two more tries, he shifted his attention to a broken window.
A dented trashcan leaned against the brick wall, partially submerged in mud. Brian used it to pull himself up. His hand caught the exposed metal frame and blood began to trickle down his arm.
“What are you doing?”
Brian looked at the cut but continued his climb. He stopped on the ledge and kicked out at the glass fragments. “Come on over. We can get inside.”
“Get down from there.”
“No, I’m serious. Come over here. I’ll help you up.”
Skylar stepped away from the car. “I’m not climbing up there.”
Brian reached down, opening his hand for her. “Get over here. We’re going inside.”
Skylar crinkled her noise and stuck out her tongue. “It’s disgusting in there. Do you know how much these jeans cost?”
Brian gazed into the blackness, barely able to see the outlines of machines as old as time immemorial. “Fine, I’ll go in by myself.”
“Come on. Get down from there.”
Without answering, Brian lowered himself onto the factory floor. As he dropped, he heard the continuing appeals from Skylar. Dust kicked up, and he instinctively coughed.
Moonlight through the broken windows barely illuminated the surroundings. Brian patted the pockets of his jeans realizing he left his cellphone in the car. The flashlight would have come in handy. Instead, he’d have to explore through the monochrome haze by moonlight.
He shuffled with hands extended, feeling for the cold metal of rusted machines. After a few steps, a different kind of metal pressed against his palms. His fingers rubbed against smooth ridges. Trying to squint, hoping to acclimate his eyes to the darkness, a panel of lockers came into focus.
Tugging on the handle, the locker popped open. Brian reached inside and felt a canvas jacket. The material was hard and cracked. He pulled it out as Skylar’s voice echoed off the cinderblock walls.
“I’m coming,” he yelled. “Hold on.”
Brian tossed the jacket through the window and pulled himself up onto the ledge. He swung his legs through the opening and jumped. The jacket laid in the mud, pinned between the trashcan and the mill.
“Oh, God. What’s that? It smells nasty.”
“It’s a jacket. What do you think it is?” Brian asked, picking it up.
“Something disgusting.”
“It doesn’t look much different from the one I have. Come and look,” Brian said as he carried it to the car. He laid the dried-out jacket on the roof and found his folded up on the backseat. He laid it on the roof beside the one from the mill. “What if this was his jacket?”
“The ghost’s jacket?”
“Yeah, why not?”
“It could be anyone’s. I mean, just like you said, it looks a lot like yours,” Skylar said, pointing at them.
“But the factory closed. Why would have someone left their jacket? They could have taken it home on the last day. But, if he really did die on the job, then the jacket might have stayed in the locker.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
Brian checked the pockets. He found a folded-up paper, hard and brittle to the touch. “Look at this,” he said, holding it in the air.
“What’s that?”
“I don’t know,” Brian said, carefully unfolding it as the edges disintegrated in his hands.
“It looks like a newspaper clipping,” Skylar said, leaning in to get a better look.
“It’s an obituary,” Brian said, letting the small section of newspaper rest in his open palm. “Most of his name is cut off. But you can see some of his picture. He looks pretty old. It says he died on March 23rd.”
“What year?”
Brian tilted his hands to try and catch the glow of the far-off streetlamp. “1950 something, maybe. It’s really faded.”
“That means the jacket could have been in there for seventy years.”
Brian carefully refolded the newspaper clipping and slipped it into the jacket pocket where he found it. “I wish I could try this on.”
“Why don’t you?”
“It’d probably break apart. Look how stiff it is.”
Skylar massaged her bellybutton ring. “Are you sure we don’t have anything to worry about?”
“What are you talking about?” Brian asked, annoyed by Skylar’s disinterest in the jacket.
“You know.”
“Will you just chill out about that?”
“I just don’t want to end up like my sister.”
“You’re not going to.”
“Do you promise?”
“Jesus, yes, I promise.”
Skylar looked up at the night sky. The stars radiated something more than a heavenly glow. “Did you know the stars we see burned out a long time ago?”
“No, I didn’t know that.”
“Mr. Burns told us that last week. Now it’s all I can think about. How they aren’t really there anymore. They just look like they are.” Her eyes remained focused on one particular star. The brightest in the night sky. She could sense the star’s reflection glimmering in her eyes. “That’s how I feel sometimes.”
Kevin Joseph Reigle’s short stories have appeared in Beyond Words, The Dillydoun Review, Drunk Monkeys, Bridge Eight, Pensworth, Prometheus Dreaming, BQW, Bright Flash and others. He is an English Professor at the University of the Cumberlands.