Strange Folk You'll Never Meet

by A. A. Balaskovits

“I think,” Bella said, tasting the words on her tongue and finding them sour, “I think she’s a ghost.”

  Martha hummed. “I thought ghosts were invisible.”

  Bella blinked. “I…”

  As the water heated up, Martha brought up all other sorts of facts she knew about ghosts: they were often tied to places, not people, they could be malevolent, not just irritating, and they were stuck between two places they could not reach, life and the afterlife, so it was a little unreasonable to expect a girl whose feet were getting dirty and who everyone could plainly see was anything other than that. Plus, ghosts did things like move furniture or flicker lights. They didn’t just stare at people.

  “Where did you learn all that?” Bella asked as the teapot screamed.

  “The tours. They’re claiming the motel is haunted now. Lets them charge ten extra a night.”

  Bella took the cup of tea Martha offered and sipped. It burned and tasted cheap, but it was the kind of cheap burn Bella was used to. She didn’t want to say any more, but this was a rare opportunity to talk to someone. Her sons wouldn’t understand. They were too young. Even mad words need to be voiced, sometimes.

  “I went into the tree,” Bella said.

  Martha tsked and blew on her drink. “Recently?”

  “No, no. Before the boys. When he…I don’t believe in this sort of thing. But that woman was murdered and put there and I disturbed her…her grave.”

  Martha cut her off. “I hardly think a ghost would wait that long to begin haunting you. Isn’t there a time limit for that sort of thing?”

  “What else could it be?” Bella asked.

  Martha sighed and muttered something about Bella talking to someone, specifically someone who was not Martha, about this, but she sipped her tea and threaded her fingers on the table. “If this is true, and I don’t want to give fanciful ideas any weight, but if it was, I think removing her bones from the wood would have been more disturbing than a teenage girl going inside. You think you’re the first one who ever did that?”

  “No, but—”

  “But nothing. She’s odd, I’ll grant you that. Lord, she’s looking at us right now.” Martha frowned at the window. Bella didn’t look. “She’s lost and she’s attached herself to you. Her parents are probably worried sick about her.”

  Bella rubbed her temples.

  “You know, it’s funny. I think this is the most you’ve ever said to me. She’s really got you bothered, doesn’t she? Look,” Martha said gently, “I came for two reasons today. Your laundry and because he came into the store last night. Asking after you, like when you usually came in. He said he wanted to talk to you.”

  Bella placed her hands in her lap and looked out the window at the girl. The boys were still throwing the ball at one another, but the girl was looking in at Bella, that frown dipping her face ugly.

  “I said it was none of my business,” Martha continued on. “But he’s a tenacious one.”

  * * *

  Wearing one of Artie or Georgie’s shirts, the girl, somehow, managed to look even more pale with the black against her skin. She didn’t answer any of Georgie’s questions, and though Bella had a few of her own, she figured if the girl didn’t want to talk to him, she probably wasn’t going to talk to her either. She didn’t eat or drink anything, even though Artie insisted that Bella make her a sandwich. Either she didn’t like well water or, as Bella was now convinced, the girl wasn’t from this world.

  The boys watched television that evening and Bella excused herself to sit on the porch. She assumed the girl would follow her and she didn’t want the boys to hear.

  After some time, the girl did follow her out. She stood until Bella asked her to sit next to her, and was surprised to see the girl listened, crossing her legs over one another, the same way her boys sat. Bella looked at the girl’s belly, trying to see if there was the slow up and down of breathing, but the shirt was too baggy on her.

  “Why,” Bella started, almost losing her nerve. The girl turned to face her. “Why are you here?”

  She didn’t know what she expected the girl to do: open her mouth and say, “I’m from Pittsburgh and I got lost?” or “You disturbed my favorite worm that day, and it took me over ten years to find you.” This close, Bella could see the green speckled in the girl’s brown irises, a really pretty color, like her mother had when she still had eyes, and would have suited the girl’s face fine if her eyes weren’t so damn big.

  “Are you haunting me?” Bella finally asked. The girl did not respond, but her eyes, somehow, beyond the limits of the possible, got even larger.

  All the unsettling feelings, guts churned, teeth rubbed against the enamel of each other, the part where you can feel your skin covering you, holding you in, the moment when you are aware of your mouth taking in air, rolling into your lungs and releasing, overcame Bella, and she was almost knocked sideways by the whole of it, all at once.

  It had been a long time since she felt much, except fear, except smallness.

  She thought about all the comforting things in the world; how linen smelled like clean when it came out of the dryer, how the knobs ticked over each setting, how socks can be turned inside out to give them a few more wears, how nice it was to not smell like a body on that day after the laundry was done, how she was never reminded that she had a body on those days, before the sweat set in. How it bought her time between the risk of the next clean. But even those things could not make her forget what her body felt like, what her voice sounded like in her head, as one does after they awaken from a deep slumber, and memory drives forward to awareness.

  Awakened.

  “Where did you come from?” Bella asked, the words pulled out of her lips.

  The girl turned her head to the distance, out towards the fields where, a few miles away, the tree sat alone on a small hill, and pointed.

  * * *

  The air smelled bad in the tree, like sour wine and dirt. It had been reconstructed as best as possible after the bones were removed, so little light managed to penetrate inside. Bella had to duck and twist herself to get her whole body to fit, and her nose touched the wood when she was fully confined. She held her breath as long as possible, straining to hear the cheers of the others outside the wood. The longer she stayed inside, the longer they would admire her, but she could only hold her breath for a little over a minute, and when she released it she tasted the air and almost blanched, and felt something crawl on her arm, wet and sick.

  She heard herself screaming and she did not stop until he reached inside and pulled her out.

  “It’s okay,” he hold her as he gathered her in his arms. “It’s alright. It’s just a tree.”

  The others were looking at her with a mix of amusement and disgust. One of them called her a pussy.

  “Go off,” he told them. “None of you had the guts to go in.”

  He held her as she shook and rubbed at her arms, trying to get rid of the feeling of that small, living thing on her. He held her even as the others left, bored with the tree or with her, and then she started to cry. She couldn’t help herself.

  “Hey, hey now,” he said. “It’s okay. Just look forward, okay? Look at all that green. Don’t look behind you. You won’t see it if you look straight ahead. If you don’t see it, it’s not there, right?”

  Right. She looked ahead, out into the expanse of green and browning grass, and thought it was good advice.

  Such good advice, she kept looking ahead when he put his cheek against hers and repeated, don’t look behind you. She didn’t look behind her when he put his lips on her cheek, and didn’t move when his hand reached under the neckline of her dirty dress. She didn’t look behind her when he dirtied his own clothes by tossing them off, one piece after another, onto the ground.

  When he left, when he finally left, Bella breathed in and out, but she did not turn to look at
the tree.

  * * *

  In the morning, she woke up alone, but she woke up feeling. She stood up and felt all the points and pricks that she remembered as numbness fading away from having your arms or legs in one position for too long, and she felt it all over. The light from the sun was too bright, and when she looked out her window at the green grass, the color felt overwhelming.

  But it also felt good, like tonguing the sore spot in your gums where the milk teeth were about to come loose.

  Artie eyed her with the indignant suspicion only a ten-year-old is capable of. Bella bustled around her little-used kitchen, marveling at just how many wooden spoons she owned as she whipped the children up a batch of cornmeal pancakes after smelling the package to make sure it had not gone bad. She didn’t remember when she purchased it. As she whisked the batter she answered Georgie’s questions as soon as she could get a word in, though his enthusiasm did not allow her to answer much beyond a yes, no, or I’m not sure before he launched into another set. The girl sat between the boys and watched Bella, but her eyes seemed a little less large this morning, a little less terrifying.

  “What do you think her name is?” Georgie asked, kicking his feet back and forth.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Everyone has a name.”

  “Yes.”

  “I like my name,” Georgie said, sniffing the air as the batter hit the oiled pan.

  Bella didn’t remember who taught her this recipe, but she did remember the movement of flipping the cakes over once the edges were brown. She remembered the smell. It reminded her of Sunday mornings.

  She made enough cakes for all of them, and even set a small stack in front of the girl. What was left of the honey was poured on top, and she answered Georgie that, yes, she liked these cakes. Yes, she might make them again tomorrow. Yes, maybe they could have them for dinner, too.

  “Can we play outside?” Georgie asked her. The question surprised her; the boys rarely asked her if they could. They often just did.

  Bella took a long sip of tea; her throat felt dry from speaking. “I’m taking her back,” she told them.

  “Back where?” Artie asked, frowning.

  “Where she came from.”

  “Aw,” Georgie said. “Where did she come from?” He turned to the girl. “Where did you come from?” Then he looked up at the ceiling and squinted his eyes. “Where did I come from?”

  Georgie yelped and glared at his brother. Artie must have kicked him under the table.

  After they were done eating the boys piled the plates in the sink. Georgie took the girl to watch cartoons with him with the desperation of someone who is about to lose their beloved pet goldfish. Bella ran the water and poured soap on a sponge that had seen fresher days. She hummed a song that wasn’t a song, just noise, deciding that she liked the sound of it all the same.

  “Mom?” Artie asked. She turned and looked at him, his scrunched face, the way he twitched his fingers into a fist and back flat again. He took an unsteady step towards her, wobbling in his socks, then slowly put his arms around her waist and burrowed his face into her belly.

  “You have to put your arms around me,” he said when she didn’t move.

  “Oh,” Bella said, and did.

  He felt small and greasy, like all little boys did, but Bella found that she liked the way her fingers felt in his hair, how it reminded her of her own. He left a wet stain on her dress where his face was pressed up against her belly, and Bella thought about how tall he had become.

  * * *

  There are some stories that say all the pain in the world began at a tree.

  From her house it was about a twenty-minute walk, mostly along an old winding two-lane highway. The girl dutifully strayed behind her and waited patiently when Bella slipped over a small hole and fell to her knees, smudging the hem of her dress with dirt. She got up and wiped the mud off her knee where it mixed with a little bit of blood from a scratch. If there was pain, she did not feel it. She thought about how she’d have to wash the dress, how it might need two cycles if the blood set. Not that blood ever really gets out.

  The girl’s eyes went wide again, and Bella felt the sting in her knees. The pain was a memory of skinned knees and curled toes, and it, inexplicably, as pain can do, helped her put one foot in front of the other.

  Cars passed them on the road, going at least ten miles over the already generous speed limit. Someone honked at her and started to slow, but Bella did not turn her head to look. She headed up the small mound, not quite a hill, the girl trailing behind.

  In front of the tree, Bella wondered if she miscalculated the journey, though she was so good at futile counting. The tree was smaller than she recalled—in her head, its spindly branches could almost reach the moon, but in the light, with her eyes, it was only a foot or two larger than she was, just a bit squatter than she was, though it was as dark and rotten as she recalled. She waved a limp hand at the tree, a way of saying “well, you’re home now,” to the girl, but the little thing only stared at her, as if waiting for some miracle.

  Bella counted to ten. Then she counted to twenty. Nothing. She thought, perhaps if she counted to the number it takes to finish a load, something would happen. It was a ritual she needed to keep herself quiet, and the girl, if she was from the tree, would need a similar sort of incantation.

  “One,” Bella started. “Two.”

  She was halfway to the 1,920 seconds she needed to count when she gave up, seeing as the girl wasn’t even moving. At a loss, Bella walked to the sign in front of the tree and read.

  No-name woman. Petite. Found with her legs bent into her spine and mushrooms on her face. Snugly-packed, as if she had been born inside. Worms, mud and rot. Perpetrator unknown. To learn more, follow the road to…

  “Did it hurt?” Bella asked the girl. “When you were put inside?”

  The girl nodded.

  Coming up the other side of the hill, she heard the soft stomp of feet moving towards them, and she cursed under her breath that there would be a tour, now, when she was attempting something like an exorcism. But it was not a tour, only a lone man in leather loafers and a crisp button-up, not so different from what he wore that day. Him.

  He said her name.

  She saw his mouth move, saw how his lips carefully rounded and flattened, how his tongue rested against his front teeth as he tasted letters, but she could not make out what he was saying. She heard only her own smallness, though she was no longer small, how it sounded like the low whine of a teapot on the stove. He moved towards her, raising his hands with his palms out like one does with a frightened stray dog.

  “Bella,” he said. “There’s something I need to say to you.”

  That, she heard, and opened her mouth to reply, but only a low whine came out.

  “Those boys,” he kept going. “Are they…?”

  She curled down into herself, a ball of flesh and cotton, and put her fingers over her face, but dared not cover her eyes in case he tried to reach out to her.

  He stopped, blessedly stopped moving, face scrunched into involuntary disgust. “I’m not trying to scare you,” he said. Her fingers shook on her face.

  He shook his head and looked around, raising an eyebrow at the girl, then turning his attention back to the huddled woman in front of him. “Okay, okay. How about…how about you go first. Is there anything you want to say to me?”

  She opened her mouth, for there were things, buried words, she wished to articulate, but they circled in her lungs and refused to reach her throat, and when she tried to push them out only a gurgle of spit came forward.

  He took a step towards her, hand reaching out, and then the girl moved to stand in front of him. He withdrew his hand, his own eyes going wide.

  Then, the girl opened her mouth.

  Worms and fungus did not fall out of her; instead, i
t was Bella’s own voice, one she recognized from the times when she liked to speak, how she used to like to speak, and she was screaming.

  “FIFTEEN MINUTES TO WASH MUD OUT OF BLUE COTTON. TWENTY FOR BLOOD THAT NEVER GETS OUT. THIRTY MINUTES TO DRY. THE BLEACH WILL STAIN. ALL THAT IS LEFT BEHIND ARE STREAKS. CANNOT COLOR THEM IN. IT REMAINS. IT REMAINS. EVERYTHING RUINED REMAINS.”

  She yelled the brands of Bella’s favorite detergent. She screamed how legs hurt to bend. She cried out about the thin layers of panties, and how they cannot catch everything that falls. She yelled how much bleach cost ten years ago when bought in bulk.

  Bella closed her eyes under the onslaught of her own voice, and felt herself calm with each shrieked word, as if it was a lullaby, one of those sweet songs she never sang to her boys, or to herself.

  When she opened her eyes, the man was gone, as if he had never been there at all. The girl stood before her, her mouth closed and her eyes a little less wide, almost normal for a girl her age, almost like Bella’s own.

  Bella lifted her hands to the girl, whose own smaller hands met hers. Are these my hands, or hers? But it didn’t matter, not really, in that place where hurt was crafted and conceived. There was mud on the tips of the girl’s fingers, and Bella bent her head low to put her lips on those stains.

  “Come,” she told the girl. “Your brothers will want dinner.”

  They walked off, dirty hand in clean. Before the tree was out of sight, Bella paused to turn around and look at it.

  When she asked about her grandmother, her father lowered his voice and told her the woman was a witch, made of woman’s cruel magic—poisons and childbirth. When she lived among people, the villagers spat on her doorstop for luck and overcharged her for bread and meat. What else but a witch’s heavy laughter made the udders on the herd overflow and run like piss? The villagers shivered at the noise and put their fingers deep in their children’s ears and bottled the milk. It tasted sweeter than honey. Unnatural. They ran Grandmother out of town by slapping her breasts until they bruised and bled. She shielded her tender daughter as best she could, but they caught the little one with short legs, cast her to the ground and marveled at the stones embedded in her face.