The Eclective: Time Collection

by The Eclective

  “Yes. Well, have you?”

  The man nodded.

  “When? Where? Do you know what it is?”

  “A long time ago. Years, maybe. I saw it somewhere, I’m not sure where. But ... I can tell you that it is yours.”

  He reached out a cold, bony hand and took one of my hands in his as he leaned forward out of the shadows and met my gaze with his.

  “It is yours.”

  I saw he was holding onto something in his lap.

  Something that should not have been there.

  What is not seen, nor heard, nor felt, cannot send your soul to Hell.

  With a yell, I snatched my hand out of his and made my way, on shaking feet, back to my seat. I could not stay on this bus. Not with this box. The people on here. They knew something, all of them, and whatever they knew, they knew too much. I could not stay here.

  I had to get off.

  Now.

  The bus stopped. The doors hissed open and I was outside in the driving rain under grim, grey skies. I was in a bus shelter and it barely stood upright. Its supports were buckled and corroded. Its panes of protective glass were shattered. I had been here before, and I would be here again, many, many times. And soon, I would forget this and I would board the same bus when it came by again. I would take the same journey, the same seat, and the years would continue to go by as I travelled with this box in my hands and I would grow older, so much older and still not know any more about the box or who I was. Until the day came when I decided to take a seat by myself in the back of the bus, in the farthest corner, and from there, somehow, in some way, for some dark, unknown and senseless reason, I would see myself, my younger self, climb onboard.

  END

  #

  G.R. Yeates is a critically-acclaimed author of the Vetala Cycle trilogy and he has also appeared in anthologies from Dark Continents Publishing and Cutting Block Press. He was was brought up in seaside towns along the South-East coast of England, which could account for his innate understanding of the Horror genre.

  Find him at his website gryeates.co.uk or follow him on Facebook

  The Eyes of the Dead

  If you enjoyed G.R.’s story, check out his best-selling horror!

  Vampires are loose in the trenches of the First World War.

  Passchendaele, 1917. Private Reg Wilson is a man with a name but no memories. A soldier who remembers nothing of life before the fighting began. Until he comes to Black Wood, a tainted place that knows him intimately. There, he will discover a darkness buried long ago by time and dust. An appetite that has been awoken by war. A hunger that will feed upon his blood, his regrets and his worst fears. It will show him what he has forgotten. It will show him nightmare made flesh. And, before he dies, it will make him look deep into the eyes of the dead.

  An Arbor Day Carol

  in prose

  being

  A Ghost Story of Arbor Day

  M. Edward McNally

  CONTENTS

  STAVE I - MARLEY’S GHOST

  STAVE II - THE FIRST OF THE THREE SPIRITS

  STAVE III - THE SECOND OF THE THREE SPIRITS

  STAVE IV - THE LAST OF THE SPIRITS

  STAVE V - THE END OF IT

  STAVE ONE - MARLEY’S GHOST.

  Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. Not that Kevin Weeser was a big Reggae guy, exactly. Nor a pot head, for that matter. But every stoner he knew in high school had a sort of day-glo poster of Marley inside the door of his or her locker, and Kevin was pretty sure the guy was already dead back then. As a door-nail.

  Mind, Kevin didn’t actually know what a door-nail was, per se, but he knew some things were as dead as whatever they were. Including Bob Marley.

  Kev had got home from work after nine, and upon completing his evening ablutions in the john off the master bedroom of his virtually furniture-free condo, Kevin clicked off the light and stepped into the dark room. He moved his tongue around teeth that tasted minty fresh. The electric ministrations of his Sonicare had removed the last vestiges of a microwave burrito he’d choked down in the break room for dinner, while the night cleaning crew was vacuuming his office. He came to a dead stop, and stared at Bob Marley.

  It was indisputably Bob Marley, which was the only reason Kevin didn’t stroke out upon finding some slightly glowing black guy in his bedroom. The dreadlocks, the chambray shirt, the gentle eyes. One of those big, multi-colored cloth hats that was almost a crochet bag – whatever you call those. It was Bob Marley, no two ways about it, but Kev still asked the only thing it occurred to him to ask upon finding a strange man standing on his beige carpet.

  “Who are you?”

  “Ask me who I was.”

  “Who were you then?”

  “In life I was noted musician, Bob Marley.”

  Kev could only stare. “You don’t…sound Jamaican?” he tried.

  Marley smiled gently. “Of course not. If my dialogue was rendered in some phonetic Jamaican accent, it would be racist as hell. Mon.”

  “Fair enough,” Kev said, wondering if he should offer a beverage, or maybe put on some clothes other than pajama bottoms. He had to do a certain amount of client schmoozing for work, but he didn’t know where to begin with the specter of an expired reggae musician who had materialized in his bedroom.

  Marley raised a slow eyebrow and rubbed at his thin beard.

  “You’re taking this really well. So you believe in ghosts? You don’t seem like the type.”

  Kev sighed. “Well no, but I believe in stress and sleep deprivation doing a number on the ol’ gray matter. I’ve got seventy-odd hours in the office already this week, and it’s…” Kev glanced at the red numerals of the digital clock sitting on the floor beside his bed, set 15 minutes ahead as always. “It’s not even Friday yet for a couple hours. And I didn’t eat or drink anything today except six pots of coffee, an awful grape-flavored power bar, and a burrito. My guess, you’re the burrito. But since I’ve gotta be back at work before daylight, I’m not going to pitch a big fuss about you being here.”

  “Then I have some bad news, and some good news,” Marley said.

  “Good news first.”

  “You will be haunted tonight,” resumed the Ghost, “by Three Spirits.”

  Kev stared. “That was the good news?”

  “Yes, originally it was going to take three consecutive nights, but to make that work it would probably take some plot contrivance like having you sleep through the entirety of the days in between. That would just be sloppy storytelling. Do you want to hear the bad news?”

  “Hell no, not if that was the good news! Do you count as one of the spirits, or you mean there are still three more coming behind you?” Kev wondered vaguely if one might be Hendricks.

  “Still three, and no – Jimi isn’t one of them. He has the night off.”

  Marley raised his arms, looking a little embarrassed to be acting so theatrical, and spoke in a deep voice.

  “Hearken to the Spirits, Kevin Weeser, and you have yet a chance and hope of escaping your fate.”

  “I—I think I’d rather not,” said Kev. “Couldn’t I take ’em all at once, and have it over?”

  “No. It’s a union thing. Without their visits,” said the Ghost, “you cannot hope to shun the path you are on. Expect the first to-morrow, when the bell tolls One.”

  “One a.m.?”

  “Yes, that is technically tomorrow, so the line still works.”

  When it had said these words, the apparition walked backward from Kev; and at every step it took, the French door to the abbreviated balcony opened a little, so that when the specter reached it, it was wide open. Marley’s ghost rose into the cool late April sky, and Kevin hurried to look up after it. He saw nothing but the night, but thought he could faintly hear the soft sounds of “No Woman No Cry.”

  “Hmm…” Kev said, and had the inexplicable urge to add “bug!” afterward, but he resisted. He shut the balcony door and went str
aight to bed. If he was in the office at dinner time tomorrow, which he figured he would be, he vowed to order Chinese. * * *

  STAVE TWO. - THE FIRST OF THE THREE SPIRITS.

  When Kev awoke, it was dark, what with it being night and all. The burrito seemed to be sitting calmly in his innards, though given its hockey puck texture, Kev thought it might be with him for several days. He looked at the clock on the floor, and after subtracting 15 minutes, saw it was just after 1:30. He felt a little silly to feel relieved.

  There was an unmistakable sound of rapping knuckles against the French door.

  Now, the condo Kev had rented after Carol read him the riot act was not exactly top of the line, and the little balcony out there was barely enough to step out on in the morning. Not that Kev had ever considered doing so. There wasn’t any view apart from rows of identical places in every direction. Kev blinked at the glass door, which of course had no curtain on it as Kev hadn’t even gotten around to getting a kitchen table or a chair yet. He could just see a figure silhouetted against the stars.

  “Oh, come on,” Kev muttered. After a pause, the rapping resumed, sharper and more insistent.

  Kev calculated that the odds were better this was a dream than an actual caffeine-induced hallucination, so he really wasn’t going to lose any sleep if he just got up and played along. He kicked out of his sheets with a grumble, turned on the lamp set atop a moving box he’d brought along to keep his suits tidy, and yanked open the door.

  “Kevin Weeser?”

  “Oh, for crying out loud.”

  Wedged onto Kev’s balcony was a bulky white kid in a University of Nebraska uniform. Specifically, he looked like a lineman, almost as wide as he was tall, red helmet with a big ‘N’ lettered in white held in one hand, exposing a wide, unassuming face under a crew cut. Apart from his size, he looked pretty much like every other kid Kev had gone to school with.

  “Dude, sorry I’m late,” #79 said, jerking a ham-hock hand over his shoulder. “You ain’t in the house on Lyndale anymore? Marital trouble? Look, we don’t really have time for that whole mess, you good to go?”

  “Go?’ Kev asked, “What are you talking…who the hell are you supposed to be?”

  “Right, sorry.”

  The kid stood up straight, and boomed from way down in his cavernous chest.

  “I am the Ghost of Arbor Day Past!”

  “You are the say who of what now?”

  “Dude, last Friday of April. Arbor Day. Today. You remember. You’re from Nebraska City, right?”

  “Yeah, but I haven’t been back since…school.”

  “Huskers!” the Spirit shouted. “Hail Varsity!”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah… Where the girls are the fairest and the boys are the squarest, I remember the song. Look, Arbor Day isn’t even a state holiday here. The courts are still open. Everything’s open.”

  “Dude, that blows, but we don’t really have time to get into it.” The hulking figure thrust his enormous helmet toward Kev. “Grab the lid, bro-ham. We gotta roll.”

  “I’m never going to a Mexican restaurant again,” Kev muttered, but he resignedly placed his hand atop the helmet, and the world washed to white.

  Kev blinked, and vision slowly returned, though now it was bright daylight. He and the lineman were standing in the middle of a cul-de-sac, facing a one-story brick ranch house.

  “Holy crap!” Kev squeaked. “That’s my house!” He pointed at a canary yellow 1985 Camaro in the driveway. “And that’s my first car! Bought it in ’92 with eighty-thousand miles on it.”

  #79 frowned. “Sweet ride, but that color blows, man.”

  “Holy crap…” Kev said again, but quieter as the front door of his childhood home had just opened, and a younger version of himself strode out like a man, or at least teenager, on a mission. His Mom came out right behind him, and Kev felt his throat constrict and his heart thumped in his chest. He had forgotten how pretty Mom was before she got sick.

  “Kevin?”

  “Oh hey, Ma, didn’t see you in there.”

  Young Kevin didn’t even turn around, he was pulling on a tie with one hand while trying to dig car keys out of the pocket of khaki slacks as he spoke.

  “Look, Mr. Fezziwig just called, Belle’s home sick. I can pick up her shift at the store.”

  Kevin’s Mom stared after him. “We, we were going to plant that dogwood today, outside your window.”

  “Oh, right.” Young Kevin didn’t look back, rifling through keys at the car door. “Yeah, that’s not going to work today, can we tomorrow…no wait, I’m at the car wash, Sunday too. Next week?”

  “We plant a tree every year,” Kevin’s Mom said. “Since you were four.”

  “I know, Ma, but it’s work.” Kevin got his door open, wrenching it as the driver’s side always used to stick. “Maybe Dad can help on the weekend, but I’ve got to go. We’ll do one together next year, okay? I gotta go Mom, love ya.”

  Kevin still hadn’t looked at her, and whatever she said was drowned out as the old Camaro roared fitfully. Kevin threw an elbow over the backseat to look out the rear window as he reversed down the driveway, looking right at older Kev and the Cornhusker, but plainly not seeing them. Kev cringed as the bumper stopped inches from his and the lineman’s knees. Young Kev waved an arm vaguely toward the house then was gone up the road, Soundgarden booming out the window.

  His mother walked all the way to the end of the driveway to watch the car disappear. “Next year,” she said quietly, then she put her face in her hands and her shoulders shook. She turned and ran into the house.

  “What the hell was that?” Kev asked.

  The lineman looked at him and shook his head. “Didn’t even plant a tree on Arbor Day.”

  Kev stared. “Screw the tree, what’s wrong with my mom?”

  “Huh? Oh. She found out about the cancer today.”

  “What?” Kev’s mouth fell open. “She, she…this is ’92! We didn’t find out until August.”

  “She did, but you had that internship in Lincoln that summer, and she didn’t want you to worry and not go. But dude, you’re missing the point.” #79 put his meaty hand on Kev’s shoulder. “You didn’t plant a tree on Arbor Day. This was the first one you skipped, and you haven’t done it since.”

  “It was something we did together,” Kev said. “And the next year…by next year she was gone.”

  “And speaking of gone, we’ve gotta get going. Sorry, I’ve been running behind all night.”

  The lineman pushed his helmet against Kev’s sternum, and the world went white again. * * *

  STAVE THREE. - THE SECOND OF THE THREE SPIRITS.

  Kev jerked awake and sat up in bed, to find the walls and ceiling of his unadorned bedroom hung with living green tree boughs gleaming with glistening berries. The crisp leaves of a bunch of plants he couldn’t identify (because he did not know that sort of thing) reflected back the light from the lamp atop his makeshift cardboard dresser as though it had been a roaring blaze in a fireplace. Kev winced, throwing both hands up in front of his face, and a deep female voice boomed:

  “I am the Ghost of Arbor Day Present! Look upon me!”

  Kev did so, and dropped his jaw like it was greased. A woman sat on a great throne right between the bathroom door and a folding clothes hamper Kev had mainly missed. Balled black socks and wadded boxers lay in sad little piles around it. She was gorgeous, gargantuan in all the right places which a green robe lined with white fur strained to contain. A fiery corona of red hair surrounded her beautiful face and flashing green eyes.

  “You have never seen the like of me before!” exclaimed the Spirit.

  “Never,” Kev said, “but…can we not do a dream like this right now? I am going through some stuff over here.”

  “This is not that kind of dream, nor a dream at all!” The Spirit rose and swept to the side of Kev’s bed. “Touch my robe!”

  “You’re sure this is not that kind of dream?”

  “
Very.” The woman held forward the hem of her robe, revealing a very shapely calf Kev tried not to stare at. He did as he was told, and held fast through another flash of white.

  Again, Kev knew where he was instantly as vision returned, though this time he had been here as recently as two weeks ago. He and the buxom redhead were standing in his own living room in the house over on Lyndale. They were behind the couch facing the flat screen that provided the only light in the room. It was on some kind of biography channel. Kev wouldn’t have recognized the face of the old English writer on the screen, but he didn’t look anyway as he stared at the back of Carol’s head. His wife was on the couch, curled against the armrest in the sweats and old t-shirt she slept in.

  “She cannot hear nor see us,” the Spirit beside Kev boomed. “Though you may have figured that out already, from the other time.”

  “This is now?” Kev asked, voice in a whisper regardless of what Carol could or couldn’t hear. “Right now, tonight?”

  “Yes. I got sort of gypped, as far as that power goes.”

  “Mom?”

  Kev felt a shiver as the familiar voice spoke behind him, and suddenly his son Kevin Junior – KJ – appeared. The fourteen-year-old had just walked right through his father, and the Spirit as well, putting KJ closer to great boobs than he had been since he was breastfeeding.

  Carol jerked on the couch and turned around, blinking up at her son, then wiping a hand over her big brown eyes before speaking.

  “KJ, what are you doing? It’s two in the morning, you’ve got school.”

  “I thought I heard something,” the sleepy boy said, sandy hair like his dad’s all disheveled. “I figured without Dad here…I should get up and check on it.” KJ smiled ruefully at himself. “I was actually going for the baseball bat in the closet, but I saw the light on in here. Couldn’t sleep?”

  “Honey,” Carol said, in that Mom tone she had only developed after KJ was born, and been worried she wouldn’t be able to master. She’d worried about everything, but she’d always been great.

  KJ moved around the couch and sat down next to her. After a moment, he leaned against her in a way he hadn’t really done since he’d been a little boy. Carol moved an arm around his shoulders automatically.

  “Mom…” he said hesitantly, “I know you’re mad at Dad about missing the play, and all that other stuff. But I don’t care. I’m used to him not being there for all that school stuff, and sports, and, and everything else. But he’s here every night, even if he gets in late and he’s gone again before I get up. But I know he’s here. I always know that. Even when I was a kid, I always heard the garage door open and close before I fell asleep.”