advent

“Rattle” — Advent Ghosts 2018

/ Elizabeth Gaucher / 21 Comments

IMG_5863

 

Rattle

 

First appearing to me when I was a child, it rattled past the ornament box I’d come to claim from a dark corner of our garage.

Only bones. Its back curved gently along the spine, its toes landing with a soft tap as it walked, stilting, no skin on anything. Even the tail was bare, white, hard.

It had a shyness mixed with urgency, wanting something. 30 years later I still don’t know what.

Part of myself moved with that creature.

I never told anyone. Alive and not.

It still comes when I call. I don’t talk about that, either.

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This is an exactly 100-word flash fiction piece for a tradition of writing ghost stories on Christmas Eve. We acknowledge a sinful and hopeless world, and welcome the dawn in full awareness that Christmas day brings us light.

Advent Ghosts 100 Word Storytelling is put on by Loren Eaton at I Saw Lightning Fall. See other entries there.

Note: I regret being unable to provide attribution for the photo. This is as close as I could get to the source.

Scary Ghost Stories and Tales of the Glories

/ Elizabeth Gaucher / 3 Comments

campfire-tales

“An English tradition for hundreds of years was telling stories in front of the winter fire. They did this especially around the Winter Solstice which falls a few days before Christmas. I’ve said for years the winter solstice is my least favorite day of the year. It has the shortest amount of daylight and the longest night.

Imagine what it was like for someone 500 years ago, wondering if this was the year the night finally won over the day and the days kept getting shorter and shorter until it was night 24 hours a day. No wonder they huddled around the fire for warmth and no wonder the only stories they could think to tell had ghosts in them.”

via Season brings out the ghost stories! – Books by Eric Douglas.

Loren Eaton’s annual 100 Word Storytelling is just around the corner . . .