Memories

This is the second part of a circular horror trilogy. Each part can be read as an individual story, and they can be read in any order. The first part published is called Letters  and the last part published is Little Jimmy.

 

Margareth sat by the window looking down at the garden. Two weeks had gone by since she had arrived. The horrible images were still glued to her mind. The smell. The letter he had left behind.

As she sat there, the pain and the sorrow mixed with memories of past times. She had grown up on this farm. They had been happy, at least sometimes, though she always felt some kind of shadow in her inner self. Something she couldn’t really put her finger on. Something dark. Something evil.

She could see the well from there. The well where little Jimmy had drowned. For as long as she could remember, she had never been down there. She was never allowed to, and she never wanted to. What was Jimmy doing there? How did he fall in?

She walked down the overgrown path. The well was old. The wooden roof was long gone, but she remembered what it looked like. Slowly she realised she had been down there before. Long ago, she had been there. They had all been.

Memories came back. Her mother holding little Gottleb on her arm. Margareth hiding behind her skirts. She remembered she was afraid. Terrified. Her father holding a boy, a boy a couple of years older than she was. Her brother. Fritjof had been his name. She had forgotten all about him.

Her mother was pleading for her father to let the boy go.

Please, Hans! He’s only a boy. There has to be another way!

We’ve tried everything, Lisa. The child is cursed! He’s infested with the devil himself! We’ve tried everything… His voice broke. Tears could be seen in his eyes.

She remembered her brother shouting things. Horrible things. Evil things about God. He often did.

In this life he’s lost. her father said. He’ll end up in hell if this continues. This way at least he has a chance in the afterlife.

Let me go! The boy was crying. Margareth remembered the fear in his eyes. -Please, let go of me. Then he added: Fuck! Fuck God!

Hans looked at his wife. She said nothing. With tears running down her cheeks she silently agreed.

Please God! Shouted Hans towards the sky. Please take this child into your blessed mercy when the devil has left his soul! His face was twisted in deep pain as he lifted the little boy up, held him over the well. -Please God, forgive me!

He dropped him. Fritjof held on to the edge for a moment. Screaming.

Help me! Please mum, Help meeee! Then he cursed God again.

Hans pushed him down. He fell.

Margareth lay awake a long time that night. She lay awake listening to her brother’s cries for help in the well. Late at night the screams stopped.

She went slowly back up towards the old house. Such horrors. So much pain. She needed to get back to the city, leave this horrible place. The place she had always called home.

https://www.livescience.com/33384-tourette-syndrome-people-curse-uncontrollably.html

https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/v/voltaire/dictionary/chapter199.html

http://www.rustylake.com/adventure-games/rusty-lake-paradise.html