"Hi," I said. "I'm here to donate a shark."
The woman at the desk in the college biology department looked up at me. "Oh, yes," she said. "The professor mentioned you'd be coming."
I handed her a small jar, with a preserved shark inside it. "One of our library patrons gave it to me. Honestly, I had no idea what to do with it, and having it on my desk creeped me out a little. I thought you guys could use it."
She laughed. "We can definitely use it. Thank you."
"Since I'm here, I might as well stop and check something else. Which way is geology?"
The Geology Professor was working at a microscope when I walked in. She looked up and said,"Oh, hi, Lou. What can I do for you?"
"Since I was in the building anyway, I thought I'd stop by and confirm our program for Thursday. You'll be in talking about meteors at six."
"Meteorites, actually."
"Meteorites. Of course."
She nodded. "I'll be there. I'll have some samples of meteorites, as well. Would you like to hold one?"
"You know, I kinda would."
She handed me a heavy chunk about the size of my fist. It felt like metal. She said,"This is a stony-iron meteorite. Do you know how old this is?"
"Older than I am, I assume."
"Ten million years old. And it came from another world. You're holding something that...."
"I'm holding something that isn't from this planet," I said. "It's actually amazing. Have any meteorites ever hit Clinton County?"
"You know, I'm not sure," she said. "Maybe you should check into that. There might be a historic record, which is definitely your sort of thing."
The thing about the nuts is that once they get to know you, they will hunt you down. As soon as I got off the desk, I turned around, and BAM! There's the guy in the white robe, standing right there behind me.
"I can't get my car out of the garage," he said, apropos of nothing.
"Uh-huh." It's real hard to know what to say sometimes.
"The guy said it would be five hundred dollars, but now he's saying it's fifteen hundred."
"Umm."
"He's trying to steal my car. People are trying to steal my car and my money. Also someone stole my phone"
"Mhm."
"You haven't heard any rumors about me, have you?"
I looked up. "Uh....What kind of rumors?"
"Somebody was telling everyone I have a bunch of guns in my car. A whole LOT of guns."
"So, I better get back to work," I said. and retreated to my desk to look busy. "Hey!" I saw my friend Chris passing my desk, heading to the Reference Room. "Wanna look into an old legend? It's Henry Shoemaker."
His wife, Kate, was with him. She glanced at me. "Is this how you greet everyone?"
"Mostly just Chris here. How you been?"
"Good, good. We've been invited to join the board of Highland Cemetery."
"We can sure as hell use the help," I admitted. "I'm gonna pitch a fundraiser ghost hunt up there, in the cemetery. I'm hoping the board will let me get away with that."
"I'd vote for it."
"Chris---I got a theory."
"About these Henry Shoemaker legends? Let's hear it."
"Got a program coming up about meteors. Meteorites," I said. "I asked if there had ever been a meteorite strikein this area, and my geologist didn't know. So I looked into it. It turns out there has been. Out in Muncy, for one thing, near where Michelle works."
"Isn't that where evil first entered the world, according to Shoemaker?"
"Yep. There was a legend about the gods sending a creature burrowing underground to test the tribe, creating the mountains and erupting up through the ground. Now, it makes sense that a legend like that might come from a meteor strike. Workers found a meteor right there, in that spot, in 1891. It's on display at Bucknell now."
"You think the legend may have come from a meteor?"
"Well, meteorite. There was another legend, the Grandfather Pine....You know that one?"
"I don't think so."
I picked the book up off the shelf. All the Henry Shoemaker books are right across from my desk, which is convenient as hell. "In the olden days, the Earth loved the Evening Star. Which was probably Venus actually, but anyway. The Earth was so upset at not being able to be with the star that it cracked open, and a creek ran out---This was the Earth's pain. Don't give me that look, Kate, I don't write 'em."
Kate grinned and shrugged.
"So the Earth grew a tree, near Loganton, a huge tree, to reach to space and reach the star. It was called the Grandfather Pine. When the white men settled in the area, some warriors climbed up the Grandfather Pine to go to space, but then the loggers cut down the tree, and they never came back."
"Stranded."
"With my theory that one Shoemaker legend was caused by a meteor....ite, why not this one, too? The bit about the world breaking open and releasing a spring sounds like it could have begun with a strike. Want to look into it?"
"Yeah, I'm in. How we gonna do that?"
"We're gonna drive down to Loganton and look for it."
Sometimes it seems like I've spend half my life away from home. Work, camping, and travel add up, and I've gotten the feeling that I've spent way too much time in tents and hotels. Of course, there are other reasons to stop in a hotel. Like my daughter works the front desk.
"Hi, hon," I said. I tossed her a hat, with an alien patch on it. It looked like mine, except hers was yellow and mind was black. "Got you one, too."
"Hey! Thanks!" Biz looked it over. "I love it!"
"Well, Michelle wore mine and liked it, so I got her one. Then Paul wanted one, so I got him a pink one. And at that point, we're already that family, so I figured I'd get you and Tif alien hats, too."
"Dibs on choreographing the family pajama Christmas dance."
"Been wearing my alien hat a lot at work lately. Because of the summer reading theme, I've been spending a lot of time working on UFOs."
"Learning anything?"
If there was one person I could confide in, it was my daughter, who was also after all one of my best friends.
"....I saw something, Biz."
"Really?"
"Down near the Jay Street Bridge. A purple light."
"Seriously? Purple?"
"Been having a hard time wrapping my head around it. It wasn't a....It didn't look like a plane light, or something. More like....I don't know, more like a streak. Purple."
"What're you gonna do?"
"Been investigating. LHPS won't help me. I gotta get down there and check for radiation, electricity, the usual. I'll have to see what I can figure out."
"Alien invasion. Cool."
"Yeah, so far I'm the only person dealing with the alien invasion."
'Well, that's about right, I guess."
"I'm gonna need more coffee."
I was checking our inventory for books about UFOs. I remembered having one right behind my desk---A book about UFOs sighted in Pennsylvania. Of course it mostly featured Kecksburg, sort of the state's UFO capital, but there were other sightings, too. And of course, it was missing---Someone had stolen it. Government cover-ups. Am I right?
I saw him, the lunatic with the white robe, just for a second. He walked past the desk, and then turned and walked into the staff-only area at the back of the building, right past the sign that said PRIVATE. I dropped the ILL form and ran after him.
"Sir?" In public service, you have to be polite, even to the lunatics. "I'm sorry, this is a staff-only area."
"The guy said I could come back here."
"No, sir. I'm sorry, this is employees only."
We walked out, into the hallway, and back to the desk. he argued,"I'm allowed back there!"
"No, sir, I'm sorry. That's for employees."
"You don't say anything about that!"
"There's a sign on the door that says 'private'."
"But that's only when the door is closed----"
"No, sir, it's all the time. That's a staff-only area."
"How are people supposed to know what's back there if they can't go back?"
"If there's anything that will benefit the patron, staff will know."
"I think you're being a worry-wart."
"It's not my rule, sir." This was exhausting. "That is a private area for the employees."
"But I'm supposed to be back there."
"Sir. You are not. Allowed. Back there. I'm sorry if that offends you, but that's the rule."
He walked off, muttering to himself. Great. Now I had this lunatic on my bad side. I finished the ILL report and took it back to Mel.
"Can you get me this one?" I asked.
She glanced at the form. "Yeah, I can probably borrow it from Williamsport. Let me print out the label....What's our code?"
"Same number as our address, to make it easy to remember."
"Why would I know our address?"
"Why the hell wouldn't you know our address? You don't know the address where you work?"
"I just come here. I don't need to know the address."
"Seriously? I mean, your whole job is getting things delivered."
"I just print the label."
"What if someone has a medical emergency, and you're the one who calls the ambulance?"
"I just say the Ross Library."
"What if you really need to order a pizza?"
"I say Ross Library."
"And the delivery guy is some idiot college kid who doesn't know where that is."
"I'll tell them I'm taking my business to locals who know the area."
"Okay, I respect that. But what if you want to have something delivered from Amazon---"
"This really bugs you, doesn't it?"
"Jesus. Just get me the book."
I walked down the street with my son and my flashlight. Paul and I had taken to going out in the evening and looking for UFOs. Every night around 9:30, we'd go out and keep the neighborhood safe from aliens.
"Remember, Paul, check the skies. Look at cloud cover. Note the location of the moon and the stars. Can you tell me which way is north?"
Paul pointed. "That way?"
"Right. Good job."
"Look! Daddy! Look!" Paul pointed up at the sky, where there were a couple of flashing lights.
"I see," I said. "Do you think those might be airplanes?"
"No! They're alien ships!"
"Okay."
We walked on down the block. It was getting a little darker, and Paul shined his flashlight around the street. There was a woman sitting on her porch as we walked past, talking with a black guy.
"Hi," she said. "What are you two up to?"
"Looking for aliens," I said. "Seen any?"
"And are you hoping to see any, or....?"
"Depends on the color."
She shook her head. "Don't be silly. If aliens exist, they haven't visited us."
"You're welcome," I said.
"You guys seem to be leaving South Jones Street, where I live, wide open," commented the black guy.
"I got a daughter who lives down there," I said. "She'll call me if she sees anything."
"Right on."
We walked on up the street, back toward our house. I stopped near a neighbor's lawn, where between the houses I had a clear view to the northeast, roughly toward the Susquehanna.
"There's a light, Paul. What do you think?"
Paul squinted. "I see it, Daddy!"
It was white, and moving roughly southeast, and I was about to dismiss it as a plane. Then it took a sharp turn---Much sharper than any plane that should be out at that hour---And came due west, toward us. I watched the color change from white to orange as the light grew a bit bigger.
"Daddy?"
"Just a second, pal."
It came toward us for about another minute, then turned red, swung straight up, and disappeared into the clouds.
"What was that, Daddy?"
"Little man, I think we just saw our first genuine UFO."
I was drawing the Loch Ness Monster when Tif showed up. Paul and I were waiting for her outside in the morning sun, sketching with chalk on the sidewalk. I was using green and blue to draw an aquatic, plesiosaur-like monster, and labeling it CHALK NESS MONSTER.
"Good morning," said Tif. "You ready for story time?"
"Yeah!" said Paul. "Daddy and me saw a alien last night!"
Tif glanced at me. "Did you, now?"
"Bright light in the sky, someplace near the river----The location was a little hard to tell," I said. "Started off heading east, turned toward us, then shot up into the clouds and disappeared. Behaved oddly for anything I can think of."
"You consider some sort of military plane?" Tif asked.
"That's pretty plausible. Some kind of drone, something. There's a twelve-year gap between what the military has and what the public knows. In fact, I'm pretty sure we were looking in the direction of the National Guard base in Dunnstown; I'll have to check that."
"It seems likely."
"Don't tell Paul. No reason to spoil his good time."
"Let's go to story time!" Paul said, climbing up on the back of Tif's wheelchair.
"See you later, Dad," said Tif.
"Catch you guys in a while," I said. "Have fun."
With my coffee mug that said Bigfoot saw me but nobody believes him, I walked up the stairs in my haunted house to my office room. I sat down at the computer and brought up a map of Lock Haven.
Zooming in on South Fairview Street, I located my neighbor's house and figured out which way Paul and I had been looking the night before. We'd been facing closer to due east than I'd realized. I zoomed back out, and mentally drew a line from where we'd been standing out to the approximate location of the UFO.
It crossed right over the military base.
Tif was right. Some sort of military item that wasn't yet public knowledge. I lifted my coffee mug at the screen.
"One mystery solved," I said.
Thursday, June 27, 2019
Friday, June 14, 2019
Personal Space (Part One): Close Encounters Of The Worst Kind
"We're going to play ghost hunting down at the park," said my son Paul. "I'm bringing my equipment."
"Remember, Izzie's not allowed anymore," said Tif. She looked up at me. "The other day, they all played ghost hunter in the park. It scared Izzie so bad she didn't sleep for two nights. Her mother won't let her play it anymore."
I laughed. "For Paul, this is just what his father does for a living. In the evening, Paul and I have been coming out to his tree house to look for aliens."
"See any?"
"We differ on that."
Tif laughed, watching Paul play on his backyard play set. "Let me guess. He says yes."
"He says he's spotted them. I think it may be the cell tower across the river."
"I don't see any right now," Paul called over.
"I'm getting some UFO reports lately," I said. "You know how every summer, the state library association inflicts a theme on us? This year, it's space. So I wrote a piece on UFOs in the PA Wilds. It's been shared a lot, and I've been getting a lot of people coming forward with incidents. So I have this upswing in UFO sightings."
"Really? No kidding?"
"Oh, yeah. People are really responding to the article."
Paul walked over. "Time to go to the park. We can play ghost hunting."
"No, remember, little guy?" Tif said. "Izzie's not allowed to play ghost hunting anymore. She got too scared."
"Okay," said Paul. "We'll hunt aliens."
Tif laughed. "Well, I suppose her mother didn't actually forbid that."
Some little kids, their father goes to work, and they have no idea what he does. My dad was a farmer. Some kids hear workplace stories about lawyers, or firemen, or postal workers, or god forbid, accountants.
My son gets paranormal investigation.
I research the paranormal in the public library where I work, and then write it up in freelance articles. I give tours and speeches. For most people, the paranormal is a fun thing to watch on TV. For me, it's a career.
I biked from my place down to the grocery store on the way to work. I walked in with a handful of quarters, and went straight to the gumball machine selling fifty-cent aliens. I fed it about three bucks, getting a handful of glow-in-the-dark plastic aliens in various poses.
"It's for work," I told the cashier who was giving me a funny look.
I get to say stuff like that. And I'm not even lying.
I biked downtown, the rest of the way to the library. It was summer in Lock Haven, which means it was alternately hot, and storming like hell. I parked my bike on the little porch right outside my office, and walked in.
My friend Ian was there, putting his posters up on the bulletin board. Ian is a ranger at Kettle Creek State Park. He grinned when he saw me.
"I was going to e-mail you, Lou," he said. "You up for doing your annual speech at Kettle Creek this summer?"
"My family had a great time last year," I said. "I'm in."
"How about Dorcie Calhoun, the oil driller? Can you talk about him?"
"Sure, I can do Dorcie. When?"
"Is July sixth okay?"
"Works for me. I'll pencil it in."
I went to my desk. My predecessor had once told me that she checked her e-mail first thing every morning. I have yet to have a day that organized. The general public won't let me.
As I was sitting down at the desk, a guy came in. He was tall and lanky, with a beard. dressed in plain white. He had what appeared to be white pajama pants and a white robe that came to his knees. I couldn't help but notice he had no belt or shoelaces. (I, in contrast, was wearing my new green shirt that said Aliens made me do it.)
"My brother stole money from me," he said with no context or introduction.
"Uh-huh," I said neutrally. It pays to not react until you find out if someone is normal, or a nut.
"You guys have a photocopier?" he asked.
I pointed. "Right there."
"Families blame people for stuff they didn't do."
"Umm."
Nut.
He walked away, turned around, and came back. "He's an atheist, can you imagine?! An atheist!"
"Umm." I'm an atheist, but I saw no good reason to get into that.
He walked away, turned around, and came back again. "There's going to be a civil war," he announced.
"I see."
"My brother should go to jail."
I nodded, making sure I was out of his reach.
"Did you hear that the state cops smuggled cocaine?"
I turned and tried to concentrate really, really hard on my e-mail.
It was a mishmash: A guy from Williamsport with a ghost sighting in a local hotel, a request for property research in an abandoned town, a note from New Boss, a UFO sighting. The usual.
I opened the one about the UFO sighting. A woman claimed to have seen a purple light in the sky on the north end of Lock Haven. She'd been driving, and suddenly, without knowing how, she wound up in Castanea Township.
"....And the government is trying to steal my blood," the guy was saying. "Hey. Are you listening?"
"Huh? Oh, sorry," I said. "Got distracted. There's been a UFO spotted nearby, a big bright one. So there's my weekend."
The guy stared at me.
"Never mind," he said, and left.
Sometimes that works.
"So....Your last day." I walked into Sue's office. She was packing up.
Sue nodded. "Yep. Gonna retire. Mel's been trained to work the ILL department, and I'm moving to North Carolina."
"Gonna miss you." I'd worked with Sue for six years. We'd become good friends. I said,"I got you something."
I handed her a copy of Lighthouse Mysteries Of The Atlantic. She smiled. "Oooh, thanks."
We hugged each other.
"It's lighthouses, so it says you, but it's also ghosts and mysteries, so it says me, too. Hey. I'll write to you, okay? Send you pictures of Paul."
"Yeah. That'd be good."
"Yeah. Yeah."
"Dinner's almost done," I said. "Marinated pork chops, baked potatoes, and corn on the cob. Make sure you don't touch this here potato."
"I'm going to run some food down to Biz at work after dinner," said Tif.
"I saved her this specific potato," I said,"Because it's shaped like a butt."
My wife grinned. "She will love that."
We sat down to eat. Except for Paul, who was playing. There are whole days Paul insists on going without eating anything significant. I often start to wonder if his birth father was part plant, and he's existing entirely on sunlight.
"I gotta get down to my tour after dinner," I said. "Summer tours are beginning tonight."
"Is this the outer space tour?" Tif asked.
I shook my head. "Nah, that one's in July. This is Water Street. I do have a bunch of programs coming up to comply with the summer reading theme, though. Every year, the state library association inflicts a theme on us. This year's is space, so I have a whole summer full of UFOs and stuff."
"Is that why you wrote the PA Wilds article?" Tif asked.
I nodded. "I've been getting a lot of feedback. One woman e-mailed me about a bright light she saw in Loganton a while back. I think I'm going to concentrate on UFOs for a while, clear out some backlog in response to that column."
"This mean we're gonna get marched out to all sorts of remote dark places all summer?" Tif asked.
"It's likely."
"Looking for aliens from outer space."
"Hell, I think some of the library patrons are aliens from outer space. You shoulda seen the guy I had to deal with yesterday; he was odd. All in white, like a robe. And, strikingly, no shoelaces or belt."
Tif grinned. "I'm pretty sure they give you those back when you leave."
"I'm not exactly sure he left with permission." I stood up and put my plate in the sink. "I'll get that later. Right now, gotta get down to the library for my tour."
"Have fun, Daddy," called Paul. "I'm glad you're my daddy. Any other daddy would be boring."
I hugged him. "I love you, too, little man." I turned to Tif. "Gotta run; I'll be home later. Tell Biz to enjoy her ass-potato."
I arrived at the library at about six-thirty, parking my bike on the sidewalk. I was locking it up when I saw him.
The guy in white, suddenly popping up from the small porch outside my office. I hadn't spotted him up there before. He hurried down the steps and down the path---Which nobody but me ever uses, by the way, since it leads nowhere but a locked door.
"You working tonight?" he asked.
"....Sort of," I said.
Carrying a couple of bags, he hurried off down Erie Alley, heading south. I stared at him as he went.
"...And that brings us back to the Ross Library," I said, turning and stopping on the sidewalk. "Originally the home of Mayor Robert Bridgens in 1887, it was sold to Annie Halenbake Ross is 1893. Annie died in 1907, leaving her house to the city on the condition it be made into the public library. We opened on Thanksgiving day of 1910, and have been in business ever since." I looked around at the gathered crowd. "I'd like to thank you all for coming, and remind you.....The stuff I talked about tonight was just barely scratching the surface. There's a whole city full of history out there....Some great stories. I encourage you all to get out and experience them."
The crowd began to disperse. A woman walked up to me.
"I have a question," she said. "There's a building on Water Street, right across from the YMCA. It has this weird door on the third floor that leads nowhere. I mean, if you stepped out of it, you'd fall three floors to the ground. Any idea what's up with that?"
"Not yet," I said,"But I'll check it out and let you know."
I unlocked my bike and rode down to the area. It was on the corner of Water and Grove Streets, not too far from the area where I'd gotten the UFO report. I looked at the building, and saw the weird third-floor exterior door she'd been talking about.
The outside part of it, I noticed, matched the windows below. It looked to me like a former window that had been boarded up, just boarded with an unused door---After a while, you get to kind of see these things. I did a circuit around the building, and on the opposite side, there was another one, exactly the same, only that had been boarded up with actual boards. Solved.
While I was here, I looked out over the river. The sun was going down, and it was beginning to get dark.
Then I saw it.
It was just like the e-mail had described---A purple light, wiggling and streaking through the sky. I grabbed in my pack for my camera, but the thing was moving too fast, and I couldn't get a photo. There's a reason there are so few reliable photos of these things. It sort of bobbled through the sky for a minute, and then was gone.
I sat in the living room with Millie, Lacy, Kris, and Kara. We met once a month, usually at Millie's place. It was almost like a book club or a social group, except with way more ghosts.
The Lock Haven Paranormal Seekers were the county's best ghost-hunting group. We'd been meeting once a month for almost twelve years, It was the closest actual thing I had to a social life.
"Still working on fixing the bank account problem," said Millie. "Anything else?"
"How would you guys like to do a fundraiser for Highland Cemetery?" I asked. "The association met the other night, and we badly need the money. We can do a seminar and a ghost hunt actually in the cemetery. What do you think?"
I saw Millie's eyes light up. Kara said,"We can do that. When?"
"I was thinking September."
"Sounds good."
"The Spiritual Seekers are still posting stupid stuff on Facebook," I said. "I've been thinking of a few ways to deal with that, prevent them from damaging our reputation."
"What do you got?" asked Kris.
"I think we need to branch out," I said. "We're the Lock Haven Paranormal Seekers, not just ghost-hunters. I think we should start following up on reports of cryptids and UFOs, too. We have techniques and information they don't have, and we should use it."
"I don't know," said Millie. "I don't think people would go for that."
"It would make us look unreliable," said Kara.
"How so?" I said. "We'd be just as scientific and skeptical, no matter what we were investigating."
"People know we're good at looking for ghosts," said Kara. "They'll think we're flaky if we start talking about aliens...."
"I never said aliens."
"Yes, you did. I just heard you."
"I never said aliens. I said UFOs. UFO doesn't necessarily mean little green men. What, talking to dead people in a dark room is okay, but we refuse to glance at unexplained lights in the sky?"
"I think it would make us look too unreliable," said Kara.
I held up my hands.
"Okay. Okay. I pitched it, you guys don't like it. Forget it."
"If we suddenly start talking about Bigfoot----"
"I've dropped it. Forget it."
Millie nodded. "Anything else?"
I got the point. Ghosts were fine. But anything else, and I couldn't count on the team.
It was dark. I sat outside on my back porch, smoking a cigar. I was less of a smoker since Paul had been born, but I still kept a supply around the house. Every once in a while, I lit one up.
A hundred and fourteen years ago, a teenaged girl had killed herself on this porch. Her name was Ida Yost. She still haunted my house; I'd researched her years ago when we'd moved in.
I had a mystery. I'd seen something, and I didn't know what. I had a genuine UFO, and no explanation.
And I was on my own.
"Remember, Izzie's not allowed anymore," said Tif. She looked up at me. "The other day, they all played ghost hunter in the park. It scared Izzie so bad she didn't sleep for two nights. Her mother won't let her play it anymore."
I laughed. "For Paul, this is just what his father does for a living. In the evening, Paul and I have been coming out to his tree house to look for aliens."
"See any?"
"We differ on that."
Tif laughed, watching Paul play on his backyard play set. "Let me guess. He says yes."
"He says he's spotted them. I think it may be the cell tower across the river."
"I don't see any right now," Paul called over.
"I'm getting some UFO reports lately," I said. "You know how every summer, the state library association inflicts a theme on us? This year, it's space. So I wrote a piece on UFOs in the PA Wilds. It's been shared a lot, and I've been getting a lot of people coming forward with incidents. So I have this upswing in UFO sightings."
"Really? No kidding?"
"Oh, yeah. People are really responding to the article."
Paul walked over. "Time to go to the park. We can play ghost hunting."
"No, remember, little guy?" Tif said. "Izzie's not allowed to play ghost hunting anymore. She got too scared."
"Okay," said Paul. "We'll hunt aliens."
Tif laughed. "Well, I suppose her mother didn't actually forbid that."
Some little kids, their father goes to work, and they have no idea what he does. My dad was a farmer. Some kids hear workplace stories about lawyers, or firemen, or postal workers, or god forbid, accountants.
My son gets paranormal investigation.
I research the paranormal in the public library where I work, and then write it up in freelance articles. I give tours and speeches. For most people, the paranormal is a fun thing to watch on TV. For me, it's a career.
I biked from my place down to the grocery store on the way to work. I walked in with a handful of quarters, and went straight to the gumball machine selling fifty-cent aliens. I fed it about three bucks, getting a handful of glow-in-the-dark plastic aliens in various poses.
"It's for work," I told the cashier who was giving me a funny look.
I get to say stuff like that. And I'm not even lying.
I biked downtown, the rest of the way to the library. It was summer in Lock Haven, which means it was alternately hot, and storming like hell. I parked my bike on the little porch right outside my office, and walked in.
My friend Ian was there, putting his posters up on the bulletin board. Ian is a ranger at Kettle Creek State Park. He grinned when he saw me.
"I was going to e-mail you, Lou," he said. "You up for doing your annual speech at Kettle Creek this summer?"
"My family had a great time last year," I said. "I'm in."
"How about Dorcie Calhoun, the oil driller? Can you talk about him?"
"Sure, I can do Dorcie. When?"
"Is July sixth okay?"
"Works for me. I'll pencil it in."
I went to my desk. My predecessor had once told me that she checked her e-mail first thing every morning. I have yet to have a day that organized. The general public won't let me.
As I was sitting down at the desk, a guy came in. He was tall and lanky, with a beard. dressed in plain white. He had what appeared to be white pajama pants and a white robe that came to his knees. I couldn't help but notice he had no belt or shoelaces. (I, in contrast, was wearing my new green shirt that said Aliens made me do it.)
"My brother stole money from me," he said with no context or introduction.
"Uh-huh," I said neutrally. It pays to not react until you find out if someone is normal, or a nut.
"You guys have a photocopier?" he asked.
I pointed. "Right there."
"Families blame people for stuff they didn't do."
"Umm."
Nut.
He walked away, turned around, and came back. "He's an atheist, can you imagine?! An atheist!"
"Umm." I'm an atheist, but I saw no good reason to get into that.
He walked away, turned around, and came back again. "There's going to be a civil war," he announced.
"I see."
"My brother should go to jail."
I nodded, making sure I was out of his reach.
"Did you hear that the state cops smuggled cocaine?"
I turned and tried to concentrate really, really hard on my e-mail.
It was a mishmash: A guy from Williamsport with a ghost sighting in a local hotel, a request for property research in an abandoned town, a note from New Boss, a UFO sighting. The usual.
I opened the one about the UFO sighting. A woman claimed to have seen a purple light in the sky on the north end of Lock Haven. She'd been driving, and suddenly, without knowing how, she wound up in Castanea Township.
"....And the government is trying to steal my blood," the guy was saying. "Hey. Are you listening?"
"Huh? Oh, sorry," I said. "Got distracted. There's been a UFO spotted nearby, a big bright one. So there's my weekend."
The guy stared at me.
"Never mind," he said, and left.
Sometimes that works.
"So....Your last day." I walked into Sue's office. She was packing up.
Sue nodded. "Yep. Gonna retire. Mel's been trained to work the ILL department, and I'm moving to North Carolina."
"Gonna miss you." I'd worked with Sue for six years. We'd become good friends. I said,"I got you something."
I handed her a copy of Lighthouse Mysteries Of The Atlantic. She smiled. "Oooh, thanks."
We hugged each other.
"It's lighthouses, so it says you, but it's also ghosts and mysteries, so it says me, too. Hey. I'll write to you, okay? Send you pictures of Paul."
"Yeah. That'd be good."
"Yeah. Yeah."
"Dinner's almost done," I said. "Marinated pork chops, baked potatoes, and corn on the cob. Make sure you don't touch this here potato."
"I'm going to run some food down to Biz at work after dinner," said Tif.
"I saved her this specific potato," I said,"Because it's shaped like a butt."
My wife grinned. "She will love that."
We sat down to eat. Except for Paul, who was playing. There are whole days Paul insists on going without eating anything significant. I often start to wonder if his birth father was part plant, and he's existing entirely on sunlight.
"I gotta get down to my tour after dinner," I said. "Summer tours are beginning tonight."
"Is this the outer space tour?" Tif asked.
I shook my head. "Nah, that one's in July. This is Water Street. I do have a bunch of programs coming up to comply with the summer reading theme, though. Every year, the state library association inflicts a theme on us. This year's is space, so I have a whole summer full of UFOs and stuff."
"Is that why you wrote the PA Wilds article?" Tif asked.
I nodded. "I've been getting a lot of feedback. One woman e-mailed me about a bright light she saw in Loganton a while back. I think I'm going to concentrate on UFOs for a while, clear out some backlog in response to that column."
"This mean we're gonna get marched out to all sorts of remote dark places all summer?" Tif asked.
"It's likely."
"Looking for aliens from outer space."
"Hell, I think some of the library patrons are aliens from outer space. You shoulda seen the guy I had to deal with yesterday; he was odd. All in white, like a robe. And, strikingly, no shoelaces or belt."
Tif grinned. "I'm pretty sure they give you those back when you leave."
"I'm not exactly sure he left with permission." I stood up and put my plate in the sink. "I'll get that later. Right now, gotta get down to the library for my tour."
"Have fun, Daddy," called Paul. "I'm glad you're my daddy. Any other daddy would be boring."
I hugged him. "I love you, too, little man." I turned to Tif. "Gotta run; I'll be home later. Tell Biz to enjoy her ass-potato."
I arrived at the library at about six-thirty, parking my bike on the sidewalk. I was locking it up when I saw him.
The guy in white, suddenly popping up from the small porch outside my office. I hadn't spotted him up there before. He hurried down the steps and down the path---Which nobody but me ever uses, by the way, since it leads nowhere but a locked door.
"You working tonight?" he asked.
"....Sort of," I said.
Carrying a couple of bags, he hurried off down Erie Alley, heading south. I stared at him as he went.
"...And that brings us back to the Ross Library," I said, turning and stopping on the sidewalk. "Originally the home of Mayor Robert Bridgens in 1887, it was sold to Annie Halenbake Ross is 1893. Annie died in 1907, leaving her house to the city on the condition it be made into the public library. We opened on Thanksgiving day of 1910, and have been in business ever since." I looked around at the gathered crowd. "I'd like to thank you all for coming, and remind you.....The stuff I talked about tonight was just barely scratching the surface. There's a whole city full of history out there....Some great stories. I encourage you all to get out and experience them."
The crowd began to disperse. A woman walked up to me.
"I have a question," she said. "There's a building on Water Street, right across from the YMCA. It has this weird door on the third floor that leads nowhere. I mean, if you stepped out of it, you'd fall three floors to the ground. Any idea what's up with that?"
"Not yet," I said,"But I'll check it out and let you know."
I unlocked my bike and rode down to the area. It was on the corner of Water and Grove Streets, not too far from the area where I'd gotten the UFO report. I looked at the building, and saw the weird third-floor exterior door she'd been talking about.
The outside part of it, I noticed, matched the windows below. It looked to me like a former window that had been boarded up, just boarded with an unused door---After a while, you get to kind of see these things. I did a circuit around the building, and on the opposite side, there was another one, exactly the same, only that had been boarded up with actual boards. Solved.
While I was here, I looked out over the river. The sun was going down, and it was beginning to get dark.
Then I saw it.
It was just like the e-mail had described---A purple light, wiggling and streaking through the sky. I grabbed in my pack for my camera, but the thing was moving too fast, and I couldn't get a photo. There's a reason there are so few reliable photos of these things. It sort of bobbled through the sky for a minute, and then was gone.
I sat in the living room with Millie, Lacy, Kris, and Kara. We met once a month, usually at Millie's place. It was almost like a book club or a social group, except with way more ghosts.
The Lock Haven Paranormal Seekers were the county's best ghost-hunting group. We'd been meeting once a month for almost twelve years, It was the closest actual thing I had to a social life.
"Still working on fixing the bank account problem," said Millie. "Anything else?"
"How would you guys like to do a fundraiser for Highland Cemetery?" I asked. "The association met the other night, and we badly need the money. We can do a seminar and a ghost hunt actually in the cemetery. What do you think?"
I saw Millie's eyes light up. Kara said,"We can do that. When?"
"I was thinking September."
"Sounds good."
"The Spiritual Seekers are still posting stupid stuff on Facebook," I said. "I've been thinking of a few ways to deal with that, prevent them from damaging our reputation."
"What do you got?" asked Kris.
"I think we need to branch out," I said. "We're the Lock Haven Paranormal Seekers, not just ghost-hunters. I think we should start following up on reports of cryptids and UFOs, too. We have techniques and information they don't have, and we should use it."
"I don't know," said Millie. "I don't think people would go for that."
"It would make us look unreliable," said Kara.
"How so?" I said. "We'd be just as scientific and skeptical, no matter what we were investigating."
"People know we're good at looking for ghosts," said Kara. "They'll think we're flaky if we start talking about aliens...."
"I never said aliens."
"Yes, you did. I just heard you."
"I never said aliens. I said UFOs. UFO doesn't necessarily mean little green men. What, talking to dead people in a dark room is okay, but we refuse to glance at unexplained lights in the sky?"
"I think it would make us look too unreliable," said Kara.
I held up my hands.
"Okay. Okay. I pitched it, you guys don't like it. Forget it."
"If we suddenly start talking about Bigfoot----"
"I've dropped it. Forget it."
Millie nodded. "Anything else?"
I got the point. Ghosts were fine. But anything else, and I couldn't count on the team.
It was dark. I sat outside on my back porch, smoking a cigar. I was less of a smoker since Paul had been born, but I still kept a supply around the house. Every once in a while, I lit one up.
A hundred and fourteen years ago, a teenaged girl had killed herself on this porch. Her name was Ida Yost. She still haunted my house; I'd researched her years ago when we'd moved in.
I had a mystery. I'd seen something, and I didn't know what. I had a genuine UFO, and no explanation.
And I was on my own.
Monday, June 3, 2019
Virginia Is For Monsters
Outside a haunted house, you would expect to be taking a few photos, maybe some recordings. You wouldn't expect to be splashing in the pool and grilling, but here we are. It's different when it's your haunted house, and you've lived there fifteen years.
I used my tongs to flip the corn on the grill, picked up my beer, and sat down beside my daughter. Tif was sitting in her wheelchair on the grass, while my son Paul was splashing delightedly in the new pool. Younger daughter Biz was sitting in a chair, talking with my wife.
"So when are you leaving?" Tif asked.
I took a drink of my beer. "Thursday morning. We should be in Virginia in seven hours or so. Thanks for watching the dogs while we're gone. Don't forget to give Kasper his pills."
'Dad. Jesus. I won't forget. What're you guys gonna go do in Virginia?"
"We're gonna see Williamsburg, Jamestown, some of the historic places. Jamestown has a cursed tree, did you know? And I figure if I get time, I'll look into Chessie, the Chesapeake Bay serpent."
"The Chesapeake has a serpent?"
"A big one. Been sighted for about a hundred years now. Michelle rented a cottage in Quiet Cove, right near the Chesapeake, so I figure it won't be too much of a stretch to take binoculars and do some water samples."
"You know you're not gonna catch a sea monster, right? You can't even swim."
"Maybe I'll bring one home on a leash. Kasper gets half a pill in the morning, a whole pill at night. I'll leave dog food out."
"Mind if I sleep over and watch your TV while you're gone?"
"No reason why not. Have a ball."
Tif looked at Paul for a moment, squirting the side of the house with his water shooter. "Lock Haven feels weird," she said. "The city never feels right with you gone."
I took another drink.
"Doesn't feel right to me, either," I said.
I looked up at King Kong, who was holding my son in his hand. Standing around me were several dinosaurs---I'd spotted an Ankylosaur and a Triceratops already, and there were more lurking around. Plus a giant octopus.
Dinosaurland, in northern Virginia, had been well worth the eight bucks a person to get in. Paul had been having a great time, pointing and running around among the sculpture dinosaurs. Michelle took a photo of him, sitting in King Kong's outstretched hand---The place wasn't exclusively limited to dinosaurs, which made it somehow cooler. Kong's other hand held a bright yellow Piper Cub, which gave me a little smile.
"This is awesome, Daddy!" Paul cheerfully declared, climbing down the ramp from Kong's hand.
"I think so, too," I said. "I'm enjoying this place. They could ask for way more than the eight bucks they charged us."
Paul ran ahead. I stopped and looked at an aquatic dinosaur, sitting by the trail.
"We're gonna try to find something like this, little man," I said. "Next stop, Quiet Cove."
"There's our cottage," Michelle said as we pulled in. She'd booked us a small place on a working farm, right on the coast of the Chesapeake. Three goats came running out to see us as we got out of the car.
"I want to go in first," said Paul. "I will tell you if it's safe."
I don't know where he gets these things. I unlocked the door and let him walk in. One quick look around, and he declared,"Safe."
I carried in our luggage. I have a slow, steady way of packing for vacations. I keep a bag partially packed at all times with stuff I always need, like toiletries and socks. As the vacation approaches, I start adding clothes and other items weeks in advance, until a few days before, I look around and realize I'm pretty much packed.
The place was nice---Basically all one small, open floorplan with a bed on one side, a small kitchen area, and a couch. I set down my bags near the couch.
Paul was running around, exploring the place. Like Daddy does. I got out my notebook to check my notes on Chessie. We had plans for Williamsburg and other places, but the water was a five-minute walk away. I was going to have plenty of time to investigate sea monsters.
"There's a trap door in the bathroom, Daddy," Paul reported as he dashed past.
We spent the first official morning in Williamsburg, walking around the historic old community. It was hot and sweaty, and Paul wore out pretty early on, so I wound up carrying him most of the day, which was easier before he weighed as much as a six-volume genealogy set.
We stopped for lunch in a tavern that was said to be haunted, but they served pizza, which made Paul very happy. A serving wench smiled at me. I treated Paul to a soda from a vending machine that served cold drinks, which cost about $3.50. We killed some time looking at stuff until that evening, when it was time to go home.
"We're going to lie down and take a nap," Michelle said. She glanced over at Paul, presently building a pillow fort on the floor by the coffee table. "At least, I am."
"Got it," I said. "I think I'm gonna go for a walk. Back in half an hour." I glanced at Paul. "When I get back, you want to help me with the color-changing paper, little guy?
"Yah!"
"Back in a bit."
I slung my crypto kit over my shoulder---A green bag with the equipment I'd need to investigate cryptids. I was wearing my Loch Ness Monster T-shirt. The cottage was tucked in back of the farm, and I walked out and around the house, to the street, and headed east. I'd memorized the map before arriving.
I hit the coast in about a quarter mile. I stood on a small marshy beach area, the waves lapping at my sneakers, and looked out at the Chesapeake. Small crabs scuttled around my feet. The South. Jesus, the South drives me nuts. It's so alive down there, and I don't mean that in a positive way. There's invariably something buzzing or slithering at you. Most of my training is specific to the American Northeast, where I can at least go for a five-minute walk without encountering twenty reptiles.
I got out a small container and got a water sample, then took several photos. The camera in my crypto kit was made for this stuff; it had an excellent zoom. Nothing guarantees you're gonna see a monster close up.
The interesting thing about Chessie is how neatly it gets around the population problem. In bodies of water, like lakes, monsters aren't going anywhere. They're stuck where they're put. So if there are reports going back a century, obviously it's not one monster, but actually a family of them. So then you have to do the math, and wonder if there's enough of a food supply to support the population, and why they're not sighted more often.
Not the case with Chessie. The Chesapeake let out to the ocean, which was a big enough space that questions of food and population were irrelevant. Most Chessie sightings were probably ocean creatures like oarfish, swimming in when they felt like it.
I stood, looking out over the bay at the very edge of the country. It always amazes me, travel. It blows my mind how all you have to do is drive forever, and you can just be someplace. Like Virginia. I wouldn't want to spend my whole life that way---Lock Haven is my home, and I always feel a little off when I'm not there. But it's good to get away.
I heard water running behind me. I turned to see that I was now on something of a sandbar that was rapidly becoming an island. The tide was coming in, and quickly cutting off my exit route as it filled in the sand behind me.
Dammit, this was another thing I never had to deal with in Lock Haven. The Susquehannna River always stayed where I'd left it. I made a mental note that 6:30 PM was about high tide.
I turned, took about three steps, and ran, launching myself over the rising water. I came crashing down on the other side, scaring hell out of twenty or so little crabs. I moved up, back to the road, the crypto kit still hanging over my shoulder, and headed back toward the cottage.
"Daddy!" Paul cried out, running to me as I walked in the door. "You're back!"
He does this every time I go someplace. I could leave for five minutes, and he'd go through the whole thing again. I hugged him. "I got a water sample, little man. Want to help me test it?"
"Yah!"
I set the sample on the counter, and got out my litmus paper---Also part of the crypto kit. I handed Paul a couple of pieces---He's never satisfied with just one---And let him dip them in the water. They immediately turned a pale shade of green.
I matched it to the chart on the packet, and it rated a seven. I said,"So what does this tell us, little man?"
"It's good water," Paul said.
"Pretty much. This water isn't too acidic or basic, and can support life."
"You want to come in my fort, Daddy?" asked Paul.
"Yeah, let's crawl in your fort."
I woke up in the night, which was about typical, as I was clinging to the edge of the bed. The bed was small and high, and initially, I'd been going to let Michelle and Paul have it, and I'd sleep on the couch. But Michelle had worried that Paul might roll off and hurt himself, and it was a valid fear, as Paul sleeps like he's trying out for the Olympics. So I was trying to sleep on five inches of bed and act as a protective bumper for my son.
I crawled out of bed, walking across the cottage in my Lake Erie monster pajamas. Lightning was flashing outside the window---We'd had a thunderstorm every single night since arriving in Virginia. I got a beer out of the small fridge and sat down by the window to watch the storm.
I missed Lock Haven. I love to travel, but I'm only good for a couple of days, and then I want to be back on my home turf. I missed my dogs. I missed Tif and Biz. I missed the library, the haunted houses, the streets I knew.
I drank some of the beer. I'd picked it up at the local Kroger, which was something of a novelty for me---In Pennsylvania, they're really picky about where you can buy alcohol. In the South, you can practically get it in vending machines.
I'd be going home soon.
In the meantime, there was still a monster to find.
It's kind of refreshing to be on a haunted tour and not be in charge of it.
Or maybe that's just me.
We arrived in the market square in Williamsburg in time for the ghost tour Michelle had booked. We sat down in the audience in a small amphitheater mostly constructed of log benches. Paul sat in the front row as a woman began talking.
"Okay, before we get started, there are a few Yagottas. Yagotta Number One: Yagotta stay quiet. No talking, no interrupting. No cell phones...."
Paul crawled across the benches back toward me. "You said I could carry your equipment, Daddy," he whispered.
"I did," I agreed. I handed him my EMF detector and my laser thermometer.
Fifteen minutes later:
"Yagotta Number Four-B: Don't step in the puddles. Don't...."
Finally, after way too long a session of going over the rules, she began talking about ghosts. She took a long time at that, too, dragging out the first story ridiculously. About half an hour after we'd started, we finally began moving and got to the second stop, under a huge, dark tree. I'd have been halfway through my tour by this point; audiences start to lose interest if you drag it out too much.
Paul leaned over toward us. "Mommy? Daddy? I had a accident."
I sighed. "Come on, little guy. Let's go."
We got up and left the tour, Paul dragging his feet dejectedly. As we walked toward the bus stop, Michelle said,"You don't look wet. Did you really?"
"Yes," said Paul.
"Really?"
"Um....No."
"Did you just make that up to get out of the tour?"
"It's a long story," said Paul
I laughed. "The tour was boring, wasn't it, little man?"
"Yeah."
"Okay," I said. "Don't lie to us again, but I like your ability to plan. Daddy gives better ghost tours than that, right?"
"Right!"
"Come on, we'll go back to the cottage. You can pet the goats."
"Can we get pizza?" Paul asked.
"Yeah, we can get pizza."
"Tomorrow, let's find something to do that Paul will enjoy," said Michelle.
I nodded. "Let's."
It was the last day of our vacation. The weather was fine in the morning, so we drove across the bridge to Yorktown and let Paul play at the beach. Paul loves the beach. He immediately ran to the water and began splashing with his new beach toys.
Michelle sat down by the edge. I stood on the sand for a while, watching my son. Then I said,"I'm gonna go walk over on the pier. I'll be in view the whole time. Back in a minute."
"Have fun," said Michelle, putting on my Bigfoot hat.
I walked down the beach to the pier. People were fishing on the end, throwing bait into the water. If you want to see a sea creature, go where the bait is. I walked along the pier, looking down at the water. Peaceful.
Then I saw something in the water.
Down below me, underwater, it was something big, flat, and light-colored. A ray? An oarfish? Chessie maybe? I couldn't tell. It was swimming fast under the water, heading northwest.
I broke into a run, dashing for the end of the pier. I was grabbing my camera from my pocket as I ran. Now I know why every damn cryptid photo is always blurry. I pulled the camera out, instinctively wrapping the cord around my wrist as I moved.
I got to the end of the pier just fast enough to click one photo, which turned out to be basically a shot of the water with a light-colored blob in it. I watched it going out, away from the pier---Chessie sightings were probably exactly what I'd just seen: Some ocean creature that came in a little too close to the shore.
And then it was gone.
There was another storm that night. I was mostly packed, sitting on the couch in my pajamas and reading a novel. It was our final night in Virginia.
Across the room, Paul slipped out of bed. He walked over, standing just beyond the coffee table, and with absolutely no introduction or context, did a dance.
He danced around for a moment, and then announced,"Pennsylvania!"
Then he came over and curled up on the couch beside me.
"That was the Pennsylvania dance," he explained.
I smiled.
"I know, little guy," I said. "We'll be headed home tomorrow."
I used my tongs to flip the corn on the grill, picked up my beer, and sat down beside my daughter. Tif was sitting in her wheelchair on the grass, while my son Paul was splashing delightedly in the new pool. Younger daughter Biz was sitting in a chair, talking with my wife.
"So when are you leaving?" Tif asked.
I took a drink of my beer. "Thursday morning. We should be in Virginia in seven hours or so. Thanks for watching the dogs while we're gone. Don't forget to give Kasper his pills."
'Dad. Jesus. I won't forget. What're you guys gonna go do in Virginia?"
"We're gonna see Williamsburg, Jamestown, some of the historic places. Jamestown has a cursed tree, did you know? And I figure if I get time, I'll look into Chessie, the Chesapeake Bay serpent."
"The Chesapeake has a serpent?"
"A big one. Been sighted for about a hundred years now. Michelle rented a cottage in Quiet Cove, right near the Chesapeake, so I figure it won't be too much of a stretch to take binoculars and do some water samples."
"You know you're not gonna catch a sea monster, right? You can't even swim."
"Maybe I'll bring one home on a leash. Kasper gets half a pill in the morning, a whole pill at night. I'll leave dog food out."
"Mind if I sleep over and watch your TV while you're gone?"
"No reason why not. Have a ball."
Tif looked at Paul for a moment, squirting the side of the house with his water shooter. "Lock Haven feels weird," she said. "The city never feels right with you gone."
I took another drink.
"Doesn't feel right to me, either," I said.
I looked up at King Kong, who was holding my son in his hand. Standing around me were several dinosaurs---I'd spotted an Ankylosaur and a Triceratops already, and there were more lurking around. Plus a giant octopus.
Dinosaurland, in northern Virginia, had been well worth the eight bucks a person to get in. Paul had been having a great time, pointing and running around among the sculpture dinosaurs. Michelle took a photo of him, sitting in King Kong's outstretched hand---The place wasn't exclusively limited to dinosaurs, which made it somehow cooler. Kong's other hand held a bright yellow Piper Cub, which gave me a little smile.
"This is awesome, Daddy!" Paul cheerfully declared, climbing down the ramp from Kong's hand.
"I think so, too," I said. "I'm enjoying this place. They could ask for way more than the eight bucks they charged us."
Paul ran ahead. I stopped and looked at an aquatic dinosaur, sitting by the trail.
"We're gonna try to find something like this, little man," I said. "Next stop, Quiet Cove."
"There's our cottage," Michelle said as we pulled in. She'd booked us a small place on a working farm, right on the coast of the Chesapeake. Three goats came running out to see us as we got out of the car.
"I want to go in first," said Paul. "I will tell you if it's safe."
I don't know where he gets these things. I unlocked the door and let him walk in. One quick look around, and he declared,"Safe."
I carried in our luggage. I have a slow, steady way of packing for vacations. I keep a bag partially packed at all times with stuff I always need, like toiletries and socks. As the vacation approaches, I start adding clothes and other items weeks in advance, until a few days before, I look around and realize I'm pretty much packed.
The place was nice---Basically all one small, open floorplan with a bed on one side, a small kitchen area, and a couch. I set down my bags near the couch.
Paul was running around, exploring the place. Like Daddy does. I got out my notebook to check my notes on Chessie. We had plans for Williamsburg and other places, but the water was a five-minute walk away. I was going to have plenty of time to investigate sea monsters.
"There's a trap door in the bathroom, Daddy," Paul reported as he dashed past.
We spent the first official morning in Williamsburg, walking around the historic old community. It was hot and sweaty, and Paul wore out pretty early on, so I wound up carrying him most of the day, which was easier before he weighed as much as a six-volume genealogy set.
We stopped for lunch in a tavern that was said to be haunted, but they served pizza, which made Paul very happy. A serving wench smiled at me. I treated Paul to a soda from a vending machine that served cold drinks, which cost about $3.50. We killed some time looking at stuff until that evening, when it was time to go home.
"We're going to lie down and take a nap," Michelle said. She glanced over at Paul, presently building a pillow fort on the floor by the coffee table. "At least, I am."
"Got it," I said. "I think I'm gonna go for a walk. Back in half an hour." I glanced at Paul. "When I get back, you want to help me with the color-changing paper, little guy?
"Yah!"
"Back in a bit."
I slung my crypto kit over my shoulder---A green bag with the equipment I'd need to investigate cryptids. I was wearing my Loch Ness Monster T-shirt. The cottage was tucked in back of the farm, and I walked out and around the house, to the street, and headed east. I'd memorized the map before arriving.
I hit the coast in about a quarter mile. I stood on a small marshy beach area, the waves lapping at my sneakers, and looked out at the Chesapeake. Small crabs scuttled around my feet. The South. Jesus, the South drives me nuts. It's so alive down there, and I don't mean that in a positive way. There's invariably something buzzing or slithering at you. Most of my training is specific to the American Northeast, where I can at least go for a five-minute walk without encountering twenty reptiles.
I got out a small container and got a water sample, then took several photos. The camera in my crypto kit was made for this stuff; it had an excellent zoom. Nothing guarantees you're gonna see a monster close up.
The interesting thing about Chessie is how neatly it gets around the population problem. In bodies of water, like lakes, monsters aren't going anywhere. They're stuck where they're put. So if there are reports going back a century, obviously it's not one monster, but actually a family of them. So then you have to do the math, and wonder if there's enough of a food supply to support the population, and why they're not sighted more often.
Not the case with Chessie. The Chesapeake let out to the ocean, which was a big enough space that questions of food and population were irrelevant. Most Chessie sightings were probably ocean creatures like oarfish, swimming in when they felt like it.
I stood, looking out over the bay at the very edge of the country. It always amazes me, travel. It blows my mind how all you have to do is drive forever, and you can just be someplace. Like Virginia. I wouldn't want to spend my whole life that way---Lock Haven is my home, and I always feel a little off when I'm not there. But it's good to get away.
I heard water running behind me. I turned to see that I was now on something of a sandbar that was rapidly becoming an island. The tide was coming in, and quickly cutting off my exit route as it filled in the sand behind me.
Dammit, this was another thing I never had to deal with in Lock Haven. The Susquehannna River always stayed where I'd left it. I made a mental note that 6:30 PM was about high tide.
I turned, took about three steps, and ran, launching myself over the rising water. I came crashing down on the other side, scaring hell out of twenty or so little crabs. I moved up, back to the road, the crypto kit still hanging over my shoulder, and headed back toward the cottage.
"Daddy!" Paul cried out, running to me as I walked in the door. "You're back!"
He does this every time I go someplace. I could leave for five minutes, and he'd go through the whole thing again. I hugged him. "I got a water sample, little man. Want to help me test it?"
"Yah!"
I set the sample on the counter, and got out my litmus paper---Also part of the crypto kit. I handed Paul a couple of pieces---He's never satisfied with just one---And let him dip them in the water. They immediately turned a pale shade of green.
I matched it to the chart on the packet, and it rated a seven. I said,"So what does this tell us, little man?"
"It's good water," Paul said.
"Pretty much. This water isn't too acidic or basic, and can support life."
"You want to come in my fort, Daddy?" asked Paul.
"Yeah, let's crawl in your fort."
I woke up in the night, which was about typical, as I was clinging to the edge of the bed. The bed was small and high, and initially, I'd been going to let Michelle and Paul have it, and I'd sleep on the couch. But Michelle had worried that Paul might roll off and hurt himself, and it was a valid fear, as Paul sleeps like he's trying out for the Olympics. So I was trying to sleep on five inches of bed and act as a protective bumper for my son.
I crawled out of bed, walking across the cottage in my Lake Erie monster pajamas. Lightning was flashing outside the window---We'd had a thunderstorm every single night since arriving in Virginia. I got a beer out of the small fridge and sat down by the window to watch the storm.
I missed Lock Haven. I love to travel, but I'm only good for a couple of days, and then I want to be back on my home turf. I missed my dogs. I missed Tif and Biz. I missed the library, the haunted houses, the streets I knew.
I drank some of the beer. I'd picked it up at the local Kroger, which was something of a novelty for me---In Pennsylvania, they're really picky about where you can buy alcohol. In the South, you can practically get it in vending machines.
I'd be going home soon.
In the meantime, there was still a monster to find.
It's kind of refreshing to be on a haunted tour and not be in charge of it.
Or maybe that's just me.
We arrived in the market square in Williamsburg in time for the ghost tour Michelle had booked. We sat down in the audience in a small amphitheater mostly constructed of log benches. Paul sat in the front row as a woman began talking.
"Okay, before we get started, there are a few Yagottas. Yagotta Number One: Yagotta stay quiet. No talking, no interrupting. No cell phones...."
Paul crawled across the benches back toward me. "You said I could carry your equipment, Daddy," he whispered.
"I did," I agreed. I handed him my EMF detector and my laser thermometer.
Fifteen minutes later:
"Yagotta Number Four-B: Don't step in the puddles. Don't...."
Finally, after way too long a session of going over the rules, she began talking about ghosts. She took a long time at that, too, dragging out the first story ridiculously. About half an hour after we'd started, we finally began moving and got to the second stop, under a huge, dark tree. I'd have been halfway through my tour by this point; audiences start to lose interest if you drag it out too much.
Paul leaned over toward us. "Mommy? Daddy? I had a accident."
I sighed. "Come on, little guy. Let's go."
We got up and left the tour, Paul dragging his feet dejectedly. As we walked toward the bus stop, Michelle said,"You don't look wet. Did you really?"
"Yes," said Paul.
"Really?"
"Um....No."
"Did you just make that up to get out of the tour?"
"It's a long story," said Paul
I laughed. "The tour was boring, wasn't it, little man?"
"Yeah."
"Okay," I said. "Don't lie to us again, but I like your ability to plan. Daddy gives better ghost tours than that, right?"
"Right!"
"Come on, we'll go back to the cottage. You can pet the goats."
"Can we get pizza?" Paul asked.
"Yeah, we can get pizza."
"Tomorrow, let's find something to do that Paul will enjoy," said Michelle.
I nodded. "Let's."
It was the last day of our vacation. The weather was fine in the morning, so we drove across the bridge to Yorktown and let Paul play at the beach. Paul loves the beach. He immediately ran to the water and began splashing with his new beach toys.
Michelle sat down by the edge. I stood on the sand for a while, watching my son. Then I said,"I'm gonna go walk over on the pier. I'll be in view the whole time. Back in a minute."
"Have fun," said Michelle, putting on my Bigfoot hat.
I walked down the beach to the pier. People were fishing on the end, throwing bait into the water. If you want to see a sea creature, go where the bait is. I walked along the pier, looking down at the water. Peaceful.
Then I saw something in the water.
Down below me, underwater, it was something big, flat, and light-colored. A ray? An oarfish? Chessie maybe? I couldn't tell. It was swimming fast under the water, heading northwest.
I broke into a run, dashing for the end of the pier. I was grabbing my camera from my pocket as I ran. Now I know why every damn cryptid photo is always blurry. I pulled the camera out, instinctively wrapping the cord around my wrist as I moved.
I got to the end of the pier just fast enough to click one photo, which turned out to be basically a shot of the water with a light-colored blob in it. I watched it going out, away from the pier---Chessie sightings were probably exactly what I'd just seen: Some ocean creature that came in a little too close to the shore.
And then it was gone.
There was another storm that night. I was mostly packed, sitting on the couch in my pajamas and reading a novel. It was our final night in Virginia.
Across the room, Paul slipped out of bed. He walked over, standing just beyond the coffee table, and with absolutely no introduction or context, did a dance.
He danced around for a moment, and then announced,"Pennsylvania!"
Then he came over and curled up on the couch beside me.
"That was the Pennsylvania dance," he explained.
I smiled.
"I know, little guy," I said. "We'll be headed home tomorrow."
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