"Tommy knows that you pushed Hannah into the mud. If you don't tell the truth, he'll come to get you."
"Daddy, I know Tommy is just a scarecrow! He's not a real person!"
"You'd be surprised buddy. Now go wash up, we'll talk more about this at dinner."
It's sort of funny, I can remember a conversation that I had when I was 10 so vividly, yet I nearly forget my keys every morning. Dad always knew that Tommy freaked me out, so he would refer to him in his punishments. Tommy wasn't even our scarecrow at first. You see, he belonged to my grandparents. When my dad was seven, my grandparents took him on a trip to Italy. They stayed at a farm that was also a B&B. On their last day there, as "a gift for being such great guests," the mother of the man who owned the farm gave my grandparents Tommy.
"He is more than a protector of the crops." she told them.
This was a very nice gesture, but my dad grew up in the suburbs, which meant there were no crops to protect. So Tommy sat in the attic until Halloween came around every year.
When my dad turned 16, he began work as a farm hand at one of the largest farms in New York State. He rose through the ranks and eventually married the farmer's daughter — my mom. Around the time my mom found out that she was pregnant with me (my parents were both 24), my pop-pop was dying. He held on so hard to see me born. He passed away when I was three months old, handing the farm and all of its business to my parents. We now grow tons of crops and we're also involved in both the milk and meat businesses. And all the while, Tommy sat in our cornfield, protecting our crops.
I'm guessing you would probably like to know what Tommy looks like! Well, nobody ever really bothered to take a picture of him, but I can easily describe him to you.
Tommy was a pretty large scarecrow, his whole body measured about 6'5″. His face was very human-like. His face was light brown leather morphed into a pretty spot-on human face. A red "B" was carved into each of his "cheeks" (those have been there since Italy). He donned a straw hat. If it ever started to fall apart, we'd buy a new one. As for clothing, Tommy was always dressed for success. Instead of overalls and plaid, my dad dressed him up in a cheap grey suit he had purchased at a thrift store. His suit had gotten pretty tattered, but dad always said, "It gives him character."
My grandfather on my dad's side was in the military for 16 years, so when we inherited the farm, my dad attached my grandpa's old version of SAP gloves, and combat boots on Tommy. But the creepiest thing about Tommy wasn't what was on the outside, but what was inside of it. Tommy wasn't stuffed with straw, but a mixture of animal hair from the original Italian farm, plus some from our farm, and human hair from local barber shops. I always asked my dad why, but he never really had an answer, he just said that it was how it was done... Now, imagine seeing that on a crucifix. Wouldn't that scare the hell out of you?
My phobia of Tommy began when I turned eight. I was with a few of my friends out in the cornfield playing tag, when I ran shoulder-first into Tommy's "shin." I would've quickly shaken it off and forgot about it, but right after I ran into Tommy, I heard something like a very faint moan in my vicinity. It sounded as if someone was trying to hide pain. The sound lasted for less than a second, but it was long enough for me to realize it was above me. I remember sprinting back into the cornfield and yelling at my friends to get back home.
I told my dad what had happened and he teased me. He used Tommy as a joke until around the time I turned 16. It was when he became scared of Tommy, too.
It was early October, and we had just opened our pumpkin patch to the public. The farm went all out when it came to Halloween. Besides the decent-sized pumpkin patch, we ran a haunted hayride through the woods behind our house, and we turned Tommy's cornfield into a corn maze. One day, a woman and her young son came running out of the maze and began yelling at one of our workers. My dad saw this and asked the woman what was wrong.
