Maybe some of you know our Yorkshire-based fellow blogger L and her blog "Thirdage Blogger". Ever since I read her ghost story in 100 words last December, I was making up my own mini story. But only now, during this weekend home alone, I have gotten round to put it in writing:
Maisie and Bert
Early evening light fell into Bert's bedroom. The door creaked softly.
"That you, Maisie?"
She came in, the same smile on her face that had captured his heart all those years ago when he had first seen her. "Yes, Bertie."
Her comforting hand, light as a feather on his cheek; love in her eyes, as beautiful as when she had looked at him at their wedding.
Tonight, sleep was going to come easy.
"What a coincidence," Dr. Parker mumbled as she was filing Bert's death certificate into the folder. "Their dates of birth and death are exactly five years apart."
Makes me think of my parents. They did not die on the same date, but mum died in late May, and dad two year later in June - on the day before their wedding anniversary...
ReplyDeleteI was born on the day 100 years after one of my great-grandfathers. Maybe I had that in mind when I came up with the idea for this story; anyway, it was a little experiment I meant to try for six months now!
DeleteIt works very well.
ReplyDeleteThank you!
DeleteThe first happy ghost story I have read. English in tone.
ReplyDeleteMaisie, Bert, Dr Parker are Jamesian (Henry James & M.R. James).
A ghost story in one hundred words is as difficult as writing a sonnet.
Thank you for informing me about L. That one letter of her name haunts me.
In Waterstones I found collections of ghost stories: British Library paperbacks.
The Scottish imagination is much given to hauntings yet so is the American.
Poe, H.P. Lovecraft, Edith Wharton, James, Stephen King and many others.
Robert Aickman's surreal stories I discovered last year. He died years ago.
You have so much rich material in the Black Forest, your lovely towns.
The Black Forest brims with lore of ghostly horsemen, men of the cloth eternally punished for their sin, lovesick ladies and strange appearances of all sorts. Maisie, Bert and Dr. Parker came along all on their own - I never thought of their names, they were simply there, waiting to be called.
DeleteAickman doesn't ring a bell, but I did read one single Stephen King back in the 80s when he was becoming so immensely popular at my library that I wanted to find out what all the fuss was about. That I left it at that one book says it all (it was "Carrie").
L has occasionally commented on my blog, too. I don't know whether the letter stands for Lily, Leah, Lisa, Louise or something entirely different.
*Collecting Robert Aickman.* YouTube.
Delete*Discovering Sarban.* YouTube.
Sarban is now on my list. He was an enigmatic man.
Black Forest and towns nearby offer unending possibilities.
Tone is everything.
M.R. James had only one story tone but Henry James had many.
A ghost story can have a light tone like Chekhov's who did not believe in
ghosts or God or life after death.
Saki and E.F. Benson have a light witty surface with shadows below.
Or the clock may be ticking in ominous silence as in Sheridan Le Fanu's
*Schalcken the Painter* which was a 1979 BBC TV film (DVD).
The young woman who is in love with the penniless Schalcken, and suffers a fate worse than death, is Cheryl Kennedy.
The fiend from hell who takes her as his bride is John Justice.
*Barbara Murray marries John Justice 1952.* YouTube. British Pathe.
Roald Dahl said the ghost may never appear, but if it does, it should look like a real person.
About 15 years ago I spoke to a man in his eighties wearing a trilby hat and a dark expensive overcoat, rather like Anthony Eden.
He told me he had just seen a fox, and as he walked away I checked to see if he was real, for he belonged entirely in an Edwardian setting.
A ghost in sunlight as Truman Capote would say.
*The Haunting of M.R. James - An Original Documentary.* YouTube.
Delete*Whistle and I'll Come To You.* YouTube. BBC Omnibus.
M.R. James was what Edwardians thought of as a celibate homosexual.
So were Henry James, E.F. Benson and Saki.
Roald Dahl liked women and so did Robert Aickman.
Edith Wharton has a character who is recovering from a mortal illness before her ghostly encounter, a trope that works effectively.
John Bunyan's *The Life and Death of Mr Badman* (Hesperus Classics) has a
terrifying close.
Bunyan was a tinker with little formal education yet he wrote The Pilgrim's Progress and Grace Abounding. Masterpieces.
I got confused by the last sentence and at first I thought, "they were 5 years old?" but then I think you mean that they were born 5 years apart and then they died 5 years apart. Is that right? I think I'm just confusing myself! ;)
ReplyDeleteSweet ghost story, tho, that she came for him when it was his time...
You got it, Ellen. I meant they were born and died on the same day of the same month, but one 5 years after the other.
DeleteI don't think I would be able to write a spooky or scary ghost story. This is much more like me :-)
Good story! Glad I inspired you. Be sure to join the Advent Ghost Story bloggers in December hosted by Lori at http://isawlightningfall.blogspot.com/
ReplyDeleteThank you, L! December seems a long way away, but actually, it's not - Advent will be here before we know it. If Lori allows newcomers, I shall have a look and see if I can join the storytellers.
DeleteGive up the day job, this is lovely! (My grandson shares his birthdate with my father's.)
ReplyDeleteLeft the message above, didn't mean to be anonymous!
ReplyDeleteThank you :-)
DeleteThe thing is that that is so believable.
ReplyDeleteI was hoping it would be.
Delete