In honor of my trusty Asics I decided to take them on a hike where we could recall all the good times we had and then I would gently break it off with them (of course not telling them there was another pair of shoes in my life).
Now I knew where I wanted to hike to, but I just didn't know how to get there so I had to sort of scurry around and ended up on the west side of town where I had never really been before. I ended up going down this road that progressively got more and more potholes and less traffic as I continued down it. There were very few houses and it was clear this wasn't one of the more glamorous parts of town, and in Bethel, that's saying something. Up ahead there was a guy working on his Bronco. If I were a betting man I would have said that Bronco was left for scraps four years. I have seen derby cars in better shape than this heap. Trying to be a nice guy I tried to spark conversation. Bad Idea.
"How's it goin'?"
In a surly, part Native, part Texan drawl he takes his head out from under the hood, turns around and slowly says, "What? Where you going?"
"Uh... Just walking..." I stammer, now realizing I am likely talking to a convicted murderer who is on one of those guys who kills just because he can.
" " I don't even know what to put in those quotations. He didn't really groan, sign, or mumble. He just sort of made a sound that I translated as you have four seconds to be out of my sight or those four huge dogs you see barking in my bronco will tear the flesh off your bones.
I'm an idiot. Really, I am. I just keep talking to John Wayne Gacey's nephew even though I basically know that he is thinking about stabbing me with his screwdriver. "Need help?" I ask.
"no..." and then another one of those sounds.
For any of you that have seen Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, he looked very similar to the man who fixed their car. An incredibly eery look- a typical backwoods serial killer I guess.
For the first time I used some sense scurried out of there. I could feel his eyes shooting bullets into the back of my head as I booked it out of there.
I continued down the road, even though I didn't really know where it led. To my left was the city landfill. It was putting off a horrible smell that I haven't smelled since the turkey farms in Frazee a few months ago. There really isn't any way I could do this justice, but the sight was pretty incredible. Thousands of plastic bags were scattered across the once beautiful tundra. A part of me wished I would have brought my camera, the other was glad I hadn't.
Seeing all this trash just made me want to get out of there. I couldn't retreat back to the creeper so I decided to cut across the tundra back towards my house. About five steps off the road and I have to step over a bone. Three more steps, another bone. Couple more steps, a couple more bones. It was like I was following a bone scattered pathway. This kept happening. I tried not to imagine stepping over someone's corpse, but I couldn't shake the image.
Being we are basically at sea level here, besides the series of rivers and streams flowing around Bethel, there are also thousands of marshes, ponds, swamps, and sloughs. Now that it's warmed up these are basically impossible to cross. I had to go through a few times before I relented and decided to take the dry route back and basically go back the same way I came, but still able to dodge the creepy road and man.
I was nervous as I have ever been after this encounter so once I finally made it back to the road I was extra cautious- probably enough to make me look like a fool. Like when the kid ran across the road to where I was walking and I just about fell over I was so scared. Then there was the drunk guy stumbling around who I thought was going to pull a knife on me in front of the AC store. Oh and the two huge "wolves", good thing they had collars on and were nice pups. After I saw those I just ran home, locked myself in my room and called it a day.
But then, of course, I had to chaperone the promotion dance for my 5th and 6th graders. The kids all say the school is haunted, but I never really thought too much about it. Of course today would be a good day for that conversation. While we were setting up in the gym, two of my students came running back after getting something in my room. They were petrified and said they saw "The Woman". Apparently there is a woman in a black dress that wanders the halls and will appear out of no where and disappear as quickly as she came. Now I'm pretty sure this isn't true, but it just wasn't a good day to hear that, along with many other stories about the hauntings. I kept an eye out for her all night, but never saw her. My principal's oldest daughter who was helping clean up close to midnight said she saw someone down on the far end where no students would have access to. All in all, pretty creepy. I'm not excited about lesson planning in my room, all alone, today.
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