Short Scary Stories

Sauin.

I find myself speeding down a road that is, for some reason, both familiar and unfamiliar. The sky arches above me like an ancient and angry sea, grey and melancholy, reaching down to the horizon to kiss the earth. I'm going to fall into the sky, I think to myself. My car will sink down into the clouds like a stone and that will be the end of me. I smile at the absurdity, but grip my steering wheel tighter. The trees, what few there are that I see upon the road, are gnarled ugly things, bereft now of even their autumn foliage in the early November frost. My car is the sole occupant of a lonely stretch of highway, silently bringing me to my destination. "It's a good day for a wake," I say to no one, breaking the stillness of the day. My voice startles me and I retreat into my head. I let the yellow lines of the road and the monotony of the scenery hypnotize me, and soon my mind is wandering down familiar corridors. For what must be the thousandth time, I think of him.

Seamus Hagan could pass for a good man when sober. He was boisterous and affable and could talk to strangers as if he had known them their entire life. He would tell bawdy stories that could make men laugh well into the evening, and tell sweet lies that could make women swoon. At parties, he was the center of attention, surrounding himself with members of all social strata. They gathered in their revelry to hear of his outrageous stories and antics, but still, they did not know him. Beneath the thin veneer of personality Seamus Hagan was unhappy. He harbored within himself an unending sadness that always threatened to peak above the surface if he was left too long alone in his own mind.

When I was young, my father looked up to Seamus, I feel like he idolized him in his own way. They had grown up together and Seamus, who could never hold onto a wife for very long, was always traipsing through our home, an unwelcome guest to all but my father. I remember clearly the day I solved the riddle of his being. It was a crisp autumn day, the last of October, and I for my part was dressed as a cowboy. Seamus, who had been drinking again, looked me up and down and said

"What sort of a get-up is that?"

"I'm a cowboy," I replied

"Are you stupid or something lad?" he said. "You're supposed to be a monster on Halloween, something scary."

I grew silent and looked away from him.

"Come here and sit down I'm gonna tell you a story about why you look
ridiculous."

Seamus was never parted from his drink for long and I could smell the beer on his breath as I approached him. His eyes had grown dim from the alcohol but his voice was as melodious and commanding as ever. His breaths were steady and his pale grey eyes were fixed on me. Obediently, I sat next to his chair at his feet unsure of what to expect from the old drunk. I was at his mercy and he began his tale.

"Now all this business of Halloween that you children get on about is a sanitized, Christianized version of the festival of Sauin celebrated by our heathen ancestors before St. Patrick taught us to fear wrath of Jesus Christ. Now my mother, gone these thirty years God rest her soul, she was something of an expert on Sauin and while she was a God fearing woman she knew rightly that it isn't wise to completely forget the old ways. You see the Druids knew on Sauin certain doors were opened, temporarily, and the dead could come back for a night. To keep themselves safe, the Druids appeased the dead with certain rituals, some of which have trickled down to us. They'd carve lanterns out of turnips to light the path of the way back to the underworld. They'd dig up the corpses of the newly dead and arrange them at a grotesque feast so that they won't be hungry on their way. They'd go around through the town and find a little child. Then in the fields that had been left fallow that year they would construct a gigantic wicker man with the help of all the townspeople. When it was complete, the child would be shut up in the head and then the wicker man would be set alight while all the people joined hands round it and chanted to the gods and the dead; one living soul given as an offering to the dead, to ensure their prosperity and leave 'em alone for one more year. No one went out on Sauin for fear of encountering the dead in their grim procession and being dragged into the nether world. Those travelers that could not help but be on the road would rub chalk on their faces and charcoal under their eyes, or maybe wear some ugly mask so that if they should be questioned by a dead man they met, they could say 'no sir I am already dead, I am already among the dead."