Not even your own mother.
How could Janet have lost track of her like that? What kind of mother lets her own daughter slip through her fingers? She should have been there. She should have protected her daughter. A horror movie set is nowhere for a girl to be left alone. This was all Janet’s fault.
I knew what Danielle felt at that very moment. How afraid she must’ve been.
I wasn’t going to give up on her. Not like they’d given up on me.
I was going to be the one to find her, I knew it. Felt it in my very bones.
I knew where to look.
“Danielle?” I called out. “Danielle…? Can you hear me? Danielle?”
The woods hadn’t changed. At all. The pines were placed in exactly the same position even after all these years. I knew because I had revisited this forest practically every night for the last two decades, wandering through these swaying pines in my dreams.
It was surprising how easy it was to find my way through the dense brush. The rest of the crew had receded by now, heading in different directions, while I walked along my own path. I could just imagine everyone else struggling to navigate the latticework of low-hanging branches and underbrush.
I knew the way. Knew where to step. Where not to. I knew where I was heading.
The sound of her name from everyone else’s voice grew fainter. “Danielle…?”
“Danielle…?”
The echo of it elongated, the consonants stretching out until there was a gaping chasm between each call. “Danielle?”
“Danielle?”
“Danielle?”
Then it was gone altogether. I couldn’t hear the rest of the crew calling out for her any longer. Now there was only my voice. “Danielle? Danielle, are you there? Can you hear me?” Something didn’t feel right. She should be here. I should have found her by now.
Where was I?
I’ve gone too far into the woods. Too far in this direction.
The wrong direction.
I turned.
Then turned again.
I shined my light into the woods, only for the beam to get blocked by a pine.
“Danielle?”
I turn.
Turn again.
The trees won’t let me see. Won’t let my light through. Wherever I am, I can’t find my way out anymore.
“Danielle!”
I turn. Turn again.
Turn again.
This isn’t how it was supposed to happen. I was supposed to find her.
I thought I knew where I was, where she’d be.
Now I’m the one who’s lost.
I turn.
Turn.
Turn.
Now I’m spinning. Spinning around and around and around. The flashlight rakes over the pines, creating a continuous ring of light. Of fire.
I’m spinning.
Spinning.
Spinning.
I can’t stop myself. Can’t stop spinning.
Can’t—
Just then, the beam blanches over something white.
Spinning.
Spinning.
A dress.
Spinning.
Spinning.
A girl.
Spinning.
Spinning.
There she is again.
Spinning.
Spinning.
A flash of white embedded among all these shadows. Black and brown and green now white then black and brown and green and white again.
I see her dress for a split second but I still can’t stop myself from spinning, losing sight of her for another moment before rotating all the way around again.
My flashlight returns to her, the beam grazing her dress’s soft cotton contours.
This time I halt.
My right foot plants itself into the soil, almost stomping the ground like a horse clomping its hooves. My head keeps spinning without the rest of me. A dizzy spell works through my skull. The pines still sway, their branches brushing over my cranium, their needles tickling my skin.
I have to close my eyes. Let the woods settle first. Let this wave of nausea pass over me. Let my brain recalibrate, so, when I finally open my eyes again, I can see her.
See Danielle.
She’s on the ground. Huddled into herself. Her back is pressed against a tree. She’s brought her knees up to her chest. Her head is buried between her knees, caving into herself.
Hiding. Crying. Silently sobbing.
For a moment, for the briefest, dizzying moment, I feel like I am looking at myself. That’s me! That’s me on the ground. It’s happening all over again.
No—not again. For the first time.
It’s twenty-four years ago. Somehow, I’ve gone back in time. To the first time we made this movie. The night I played Jessica.
The night I disappeared in the woods.
That night.
My night.
But it’s not. It can’t be. I have to shake the thought away, force it out of my head before it takes root. It’s 1995. I’m a woman now. Not some kid.
Not some girl.
“There you are,” I say to her. To myself. My younger self. “Everyone’s looking for you.”
She doesn’t say anything.
I don’t say anything. I’m too scared. Too cold. I’ve been alone, out here, in the woods for too long. The dark, the cold itself, has seeped into me. It’s in my bones. In my blood. There’s nothing else to feel now. Nothing but the numbness of this night. Of this god-awful place.
She looks like me.
She could be.
Be me.
Her hair—my hair—hangs over my face, covering her eyes. The angle of my head is bent down. I’m staring into the dark chasm between my knees. Hiding from everything. Everyone.
I remember that feeling. I remember it so well. It could’ve happened just yesterday. Just last night. I don’t know if that feeling ever truly left me.
I remember being discovered, but somehow not believing it. Not trusting it.
I have to let her know that she’s okay. That she’s safe now.
That I found her.
I’ll protect her.
“It’s okay,” I say to myself. My younger self. I’m echoing the very same words that had been said to me, that I had said to myself, all those years ago. “I’m here now. I found you.”
TWELVE
I bring Danielle into my arms. She’s so light. Lighter than I imagined. I feel her fingers slither around my neck, her arms wrapping around me as I carry her through the woods.
Her head presses itself against my chest, just under my chin. She curls in and hides.
“Don’t worry,” I whisper. “I’ve got you. I’m going to take you back home.”
Home.
Home.
Her grip tightens around my neck. She’s squeezing me. It’s starting to hurt.
But she’s not shivering.
At all.
Her body remains rigid. Such a bundle of skin and bones. She barely weighs a thing. So light in my arms. And yet…there’s a strength to her that surprises me. The girl has a grip, that’s for sure. I try to pull my head away, to free up my neck a bit, but her arms only slither their way around, tighter, coiling over my throat. Her arms don’t even feel like arms anymore. They feel like snakes.
“It’s okay,” I say. “You’re safe, I promise. You don’t—don’t have to hold on so tight.”
She’s not trembling from the cold. I can’t keep myself from shivering—and yet here’s this little girl, lost for the last few hours, huddling into herself in the dead of the night, stranded out here in the freezing cold, in a cotton dress with its scorched hem, not quivering a single bit.
Her body is so still. So still
.
But she’s cold.
Her skin. It’s freezing. There’s no warmth to her body. I can’t feel any heat radiating out from her, even when she’s pressed so tightly against my chest.
I feel as if I’m carrying a bundle of kindling. Old wood. Not some child. Not some little
witch
girl
little
witch
girl
My footsteps dwindle. I don’t stop walking all at once. It takes a couple strides for me to finally come to a halt. In the woods. Surrounded by so many trees. The pine needles bristling.
I hold perfectly still, like I’m standing on my mark, waiting in place until the director calls
cut
But Sergio never calls out to me. Never stops this madness.
It’s happening.
This is really happening to me.
I can see my breath fogging up before my face, these short bursts of steam dissipating into the air. But it’s only my breath. Not hers. She’s not even inhaling. Her chest is level against mine. She has barely moved all this time. She’s so still. Too still. No rise and fall of her chest.
No pulse.
No
no
no
no
I’m standing so still. My legs won’t move anymore. They’re locked in place. My feet could just as easily take root right here in the earth and my arms would branch out and I’d become just another pine, another swaying tree, lost among all the others, cradling this
this
this
little
no
witch
please no
girl
no
no
no
As calmly as I can, I pull her away from my chest by a few inches. Just enough to get a look at her. To see who I’m holding. I glance down at my arms, trying hard to hold my head upright.
I peer down.
To see.
She’s staring up at me. But where her eyes—where her eyes should be—there’s nothing. The sockets are hollow. Full of shadows. Black puddles. But they’re staring up at me.
With love.
Her lower jaw has unhinged itself. The slack in her seared cheeks lets the jaw hang open wider than it should. The flesh along her face has peeled back. She looks like a gaping, awestruck child.
She’s looking at me with wonder.
With such love.
“Mommy…”
THIRTEEN
I’m carrying Jessica through the woods.
Slowly.
I’ve brought her back to my chest, pressing her body to mine. Her arms haven’t left my neck. When I tried to separate us, her grip only tightened around my throat. Her arms are now a noose around my neck, choking me if I ever let go.
So I carry her.
Cradle her.
There’s a mewling at my chest. Like a congested lamb. It sounds far too wet, the sound she’s making, but there’s a certain contentment to it. I can feel it hum through her skull and resonate into my chest, the slightest of vibrations. Purring, almost. Such happiness.
Such love.
I don’t know where I’m going. Not for certain. But I stop worrying about my way. I’ve walked these woods so many times, night after night, dream after fetid dream, that I don’t need to know for sure.
We found each other, didn’t we? We’ve come this far…So I stop worrying. Stop. I let my feet simply lead the way and I let them, I let them. I let them. Let them take me home.
Take me home.
Take us home.
Home.
home
home
This is the role I was meant to play.
Born to play.
I’ve been preparing for this part my entire life, haven’t I? All these years of drug-induced stasis, of emotional paralysis, of lies…they have all been leading to this moment in time.
Showtime, folks…Time to shine.
Time to be a star.
My life has merely been a dry run. Now it’s time to play.
For keeps.
Like the tagline says, Jessica wants to play…with you!
As a child, I played the part of Jessica Ford long enough to reunite her with her mother.
Just for a moment. Just a breath.
Now I am Ella Louise. For Jessica’s sake. It’s a phantasmal family reunion come full circle. And it’s so easy to slip into this role. I’ve done my preparation, I’ve gone over my lines. I know them by heart.
By heart.
I’ve lived this part.
I’m ready now.
Born ready.
We come upon the clearing before I even realize it. It opens up to us so quickly, the pines pulling back and suddenly I’m stepping out into an open patch of crabgrass and thistle.
I’ve been to this clearing before. I know who’s waiting for us here.
Who’s buried below our feet.
Am I humming?
I’m humming a song. A lullaby. It’s the opening theme music to Don’t Tread on Jessica’s Grave. I hadn’t even realized I knew the score, but there you go. Just a little something to keep Jessica calm. Keep her hands from choking me. She won’t let go. Her arms feel like serpents, like snakes wrapping their way around my throat. The charred flecks of her burnt flesh scrape at my own skin, snake scales grating against my flesh. No—not snakes. Film strips. Her skin feels like the tangled reel of a movie, my movie, its brittle celluloid noosed around my neck.
That’s all this is. It’s only a movie, I keep repeating to myself as I make my way to the center of the clearing. To the patch of scorched earth waiting for us both. It’s only a movie…
Only a movie…
Only a movie…
Only a movie…
Only a…
Only…
PART FOUR
WHO GOES THERE? 2016
WHEN DID YOU HEAR YOUR FIRST GHOST STORY? WHAT WAS IT LIKE, SITTING around the campfire as a kid, listening to someone spin a yarn they swore was real? That supposedly happened to someone they knew? The cousin of a friend they grew up with? The sister of a pal they knew in school?
Where does a ghost story get its power? The imagination of the listener? How does it evolve?
Hello and welcome to another episode of Who Goes There?
I’m your host, Nate Denison. Today, we’ll explore one ghost story that has been steeped in infamy ever since it started making the rounds around campfires all across the country…
I’m speaking, of course, of Jessica Ford, also known as…the Little Witch Girl of Pilot’s Creek.
For those unfamiliar with Jessica Ford, perhaps you’ve seen her movies. Jessica and her mother, Ella Louise, have been the subject of not one but two feature films, beginning with 1971’s low-budget fever dream Don’t Tread on Jessica’s Grave, directed by Lee Ketchum, and its disastrous remake, 1995’s I Know What You Did on Jessica’s Grave, which was notoriously shut down after the tragic events that occurred on set. Both films tell wildly divergent stories, but each movie roots its central narrative within the urban legend of the Little Witch Girl. What truly puts these films in the echelon of cult film fan infamy, however, isn’t so much the movies themselves but the incidents behind the scenes for both…particularly when it comes to actress Amber Pendleton. Never heard of her? You’re not the only one. Miss Pendleton played not only Jessica Ford in the original film, but her mother, Ella Louise, in its doomed remake…and not much else. To this day, it remains unclear what really happened on the set of I Know What You Did on Jessica’s Grave. Some say the production was cursed, thanks to its haunted source material. Others say Pendleton was driven mad by her role, suffering a psychotic break during production that led to the kidnapping—and
death—of her nine-year-old co-star, Danielle Strode.
Regardless of what you’ve heard, or what you think you’ve heard, there’s clearly more to this story than what we’ve been told. For this episode, I’ll discuss the historical origins behind the legend of the Little Witch Girl. We’ll visit Pilot’s Creek and its people, while also examining the impact of these films within the horror genre…and beyond. We’ll see how movie theaters have become pop culture’s new campfires, where audiences gather ’round to hear a good ghost story.
Because what is a movie but a ghost in and of itself? Films are phantoms illuminated upon the big screen for all to see. More on that and the impact of the Little Witch Girl on this episode of…
…Who Goes There?
ONE
It wasn’t that difficult tracking her down. I’ve uncovered stiffer mysteries. Her name wasn’t listed anymore, but nobody’s really are. Certainly not tarnished starlets.
But Pilot’s Creek? Jesus…She never left. Moved right where all the action happened.
Nobody chooses to live in that shithole. Not unless they want to drop off the face of the earth. Slip into obscurity and wither away. Nothing but old folks’ homes crammed full of desiccated rednecks and mobile homes on cinder blocks with Confederate flags draped in their windows. I’d need to be careful where I poked around down south. Last thing I want is to get lynched.
All the long-forgotten trailer parks lining the pine-ridden interstate sound the same.
Sandy Pines Trailer Park.
Three Pines RV Oasis.
Moonstone RV Park.
Amber Pendleton rented a slip in the Whispering Pines Mobile Home and RV Park. Guess what name she’s registered under? Ford. You believe that? The balls on this woman…
Found you, Amber, I remember thinking. Nice try.
There’s no phone listing. No cell number. Maybe no phone at all. It’s clear she doesn’t want to be found. Miss Pendleton’s interviewing days are long gone. She hasn’t spoken publicly since ’97. Not since the trial. But when had that ever stopped me before? A dead end was just a barrier to break on through to the other side…Where other journalists gave up, I jumped. I fucking flew. Air Jordan journalist right here. Spread those wings!
The Remaking Page 19
