Post by Grimm on Oct 23, 2017 11:40:41 GMT -5
The Hobo picks up a walnut and cocks his arm. His Little League coach has been working with him on hitting the cutoff man from right field, so he’s feeling pretty confident. But then Darth Vader reaches out and grabs his wrist.
“Don’t even think about it. What are you, some kind of dummy?”
“Why not?”
The Hobo. Darth Vader. A Skeleton. A Witch. The Devil. They’ve made their rounds and saved this for the last stop. The group stands at the end of the drive with bags full of candy. They each take a deep breath. A whiff of singed pumpkin flesh on the air mixes with the leaf graveyard scattered all about. Outside of the hollow the shadows grow longer, but here where the hills come together the owl’s light settles in much earlier.
Darth Vader says, “Because that’s Old Man Grimm’s place, that’s why. It’s off-limits.”
Eyes peek from behind rubber and plastic and burlap. From beneath burned cork and grease paint. The eyes take in everything. The weeds overwhelming the gravel road. Beds of dead flowers abandoned by the summer. A rusty scythe leaning against a stone well house. They look up a dry creek bed. Up through the shale and stones, the pottery shards and bones (hopefully only chicken or pig) from some old midden pit washed out by the autumn rains. The creek bed runs behind them, beside them, past them, and on up along the house.
The house, all stone and timber and cedar shakes, stands at the end of the drive. As if it had emerged from the limestone when the waters carved All Souls Hollow into existence. Chimneys and attics and weather vanes look down at them. The house stands unmoving, unchanging, resolute – much like, well, you know.
“But he’s just an old coot. I don’t see what the problem is.”
Darth Vader turns to the Hobo. “The problem is, it’s Old Man Grimm. You know what he does to people.”
The Skeleton says, “He carves up people’s backs with panes of glass. Even if they’re friends.”
“He buries his opponents alive, for crying out loud,” offers up Darth Vader.
“Grimm made a guy eat his own beard in the middle of the ring,” says the Witch with a thinly veiled sense of perverse glee.
“His headbutts makes people’s faces explode. It’s awful.” The Devil moves as if to perform Dead Reckoning, but the Hobo does not find it funny. He follows with, “We’ve all got a closet door nailed shut in our houses. Everyone in Hangtown does. That had to start for a reason.”
“He made wax statues of everyone he ever beat,” says the Witch.
Darth Vader shakes his helmet. “That was his brother. Sadistic had the wax museum.”
“Well…he paralyzed Sadistic. And that’s even worse, so there.”
Wasps stagger drunk on rotten apples littering the ground beneath a gnarled tree. It looks like a Halloween hand reaching up from the earth. Reaching up to grab a handful of kiddies and pull them down into the netherworld.
“But he’s just so…old,” says the Hobo.
“Maybe, but we’re just a bunch of kids. And I’ve seen what he can do to people. I watched one of those old PCW shows the other day…”
“**cough** nerd **cough**”
“One of those PCW shows, and it was one of their Halloween specials. So it was tailor made for him, right? And this one had pumpkins and these wicked trick-or-treat bags…”
“I saw that one!” says the Skeleton. “It was nuts!”
“Yeah, who all was in that one…Grimm, uh, Crazy Boy…” Darth Vader counts off on his fingers, and a mass of voices break in over one another.
“Gabriel, Hiroshi Yukio…”
“Yukio wasn’t in that one.”
“Uh huh! He’d just come back. It took all the rest of them to put him down.”
“Man, is he fat.”
“And Tyler Scott had just returned, too, and, um…”
“Uh…”
“Razor Blade!”
“Right. Razor Blade. Anyway, it was one of those crazy anything-goes matches with everybody in the ring at once. Everybody got their shots in, more or less, but Grimm…Good Lord.”
The gaggle of trick-or-treaters chime in at once on their favorite atrocities of the night. Pumpkins swung as clubs, or thrown as a magic missile just like the Headless Horseman. How the Hangtown Horror attempted to force feed more than one opponent the busted bits. And those trick-or-treat bags with all those weapons. All of them! It’s a wonder any of them could ever compete again after that match.
Oh, and some delicious candy, too.
It got weird.
The Hobo sulks by the mail box. He’s not as well-versed in the particulars of Pure Class Wrestling history as his friends, and he’s not taking it very well. He rolls the walnut in his hand, the black threat of staining be darned, and he looks from each costumed noggin back up to the house.
A shed leans on its crumbling foundation. Cold air rushes out from behind the cock-eyed planks serving as a door. The gust rustles hair, makes bags sway, and carries with it…a whisper? No, just a tattered hornet’s nest swirling around his feet. A storm of paper scraps, dust, and desiccated hornet husks.
Behind them, across the road, a scarecrow staked in an empty field swings on its post with a creak. It cocks its head. In the right light, it could be mistaken for a Grimm effigy. The Hobo turns at the noise and sees the scarecrow’s dead-branch fingerbone pointing at the house.
“You guys…”
“He won that match, didn’t he?”
“I don’t remember. And I bet Grimm didn’t even care if he did. I think he had a good Halloween as long as he wrecked some people.”
“Guys!”
“…and just when I thought Grimm was going to smother him with all that pumpkin goo …what?”
The Hobo mimics the scarecrow and points. He points to where the door opens, to the lean silhouette stepping into the doorway, backlit by tallow candles or kerosene lanterns or whatever it is old men use to light their dusty chambers. The silhouette sways, and crooks its head.
The members of the group look at one another, then turn back as one to see the silhouette standing at the well. They drop their goody bags in one accord and run off in a skid of gravel, a flurry of leaves.
“Don’t even think about it. What are you, some kind of dummy?”
“Why not?”
The Hobo. Darth Vader. A Skeleton. A Witch. The Devil. They’ve made their rounds and saved this for the last stop. The group stands at the end of the drive with bags full of candy. They each take a deep breath. A whiff of singed pumpkin flesh on the air mixes with the leaf graveyard scattered all about. Outside of the hollow the shadows grow longer, but here where the hills come together the owl’s light settles in much earlier.
Darth Vader says, “Because that’s Old Man Grimm’s place, that’s why. It’s off-limits.”
Eyes peek from behind rubber and plastic and burlap. From beneath burned cork and grease paint. The eyes take in everything. The weeds overwhelming the gravel road. Beds of dead flowers abandoned by the summer. A rusty scythe leaning against a stone well house. They look up a dry creek bed. Up through the shale and stones, the pottery shards and bones (hopefully only chicken or pig) from some old midden pit washed out by the autumn rains. The creek bed runs behind them, beside them, past them, and on up along the house.
The house, all stone and timber and cedar shakes, stands at the end of the drive. As if it had emerged from the limestone when the waters carved All Souls Hollow into existence. Chimneys and attics and weather vanes look down at them. The house stands unmoving, unchanging, resolute – much like, well, you know.
“But he’s just an old coot. I don’t see what the problem is.”
Darth Vader turns to the Hobo. “The problem is, it’s Old Man Grimm. You know what he does to people.”
The Skeleton says, “He carves up people’s backs with panes of glass. Even if they’re friends.”
“He buries his opponents alive, for crying out loud,” offers up Darth Vader.
“Grimm made a guy eat his own beard in the middle of the ring,” says the Witch with a thinly veiled sense of perverse glee.
“His headbutts makes people’s faces explode. It’s awful.” The Devil moves as if to perform Dead Reckoning, but the Hobo does not find it funny. He follows with, “We’ve all got a closet door nailed shut in our houses. Everyone in Hangtown does. That had to start for a reason.”
“He made wax statues of everyone he ever beat,” says the Witch.
Darth Vader shakes his helmet. “That was his brother. Sadistic had the wax museum.”
“Well…he paralyzed Sadistic. And that’s even worse, so there.”
Wasps stagger drunk on rotten apples littering the ground beneath a gnarled tree. It looks like a Halloween hand reaching up from the earth. Reaching up to grab a handful of kiddies and pull them down into the netherworld.
“But he’s just so…old,” says the Hobo.
“Maybe, but we’re just a bunch of kids. And I’ve seen what he can do to people. I watched one of those old PCW shows the other day…”
“**cough** nerd **cough**”
“One of those PCW shows, and it was one of their Halloween specials. So it was tailor made for him, right? And this one had pumpkins and these wicked trick-or-treat bags…”
“I saw that one!” says the Skeleton. “It was nuts!”
“Yeah, who all was in that one…Grimm, uh, Crazy Boy…” Darth Vader counts off on his fingers, and a mass of voices break in over one another.
“Gabriel, Hiroshi Yukio…”
“Yukio wasn’t in that one.”
“Uh huh! He’d just come back. It took all the rest of them to put him down.”
“Man, is he fat.”
“And Tyler Scott had just returned, too, and, um…”
“Uh…”
“Razor Blade!”
“Right. Razor Blade. Anyway, it was one of those crazy anything-goes matches with everybody in the ring at once. Everybody got their shots in, more or less, but Grimm…Good Lord.”
The gaggle of trick-or-treaters chime in at once on their favorite atrocities of the night. Pumpkins swung as clubs, or thrown as a magic missile just like the Headless Horseman. How the Hangtown Horror attempted to force feed more than one opponent the busted bits. And those trick-or-treat bags with all those weapons. All of them! It’s a wonder any of them could ever compete again after that match.
Oh, and some delicious candy, too.
It got weird.
The Hobo sulks by the mail box. He’s not as well-versed in the particulars of Pure Class Wrestling history as his friends, and he’s not taking it very well. He rolls the walnut in his hand, the black threat of staining be darned, and he looks from each costumed noggin back up to the house.
A shed leans on its crumbling foundation. Cold air rushes out from behind the cock-eyed planks serving as a door. The gust rustles hair, makes bags sway, and carries with it…a whisper? No, just a tattered hornet’s nest swirling around his feet. A storm of paper scraps, dust, and desiccated hornet husks.
Behind them, across the road, a scarecrow staked in an empty field swings on its post with a creak. It cocks its head. In the right light, it could be mistaken for a Grimm effigy. The Hobo turns at the noise and sees the scarecrow’s dead-branch fingerbone pointing at the house.
“You guys…”
“He won that match, didn’t he?”
“I don’t remember. And I bet Grimm didn’t even care if he did. I think he had a good Halloween as long as he wrecked some people.”
“Guys!”
“…and just when I thought Grimm was going to smother him with all that pumpkin goo …what?”
The Hobo mimics the scarecrow and points. He points to where the door opens, to the lean silhouette stepping into the doorway, backlit by tallow candles or kerosene lanterns or whatever it is old men use to light their dusty chambers. The silhouette sways, and crooks its head.
The members of the group look at one another, then turn back as one to see the silhouette standing at the well. They drop their goody bags in one accord and run off in a skid of gravel, a flurry of leaves.
