The Legend of Crooked Creek

”Won’t you tell me what you saw that day?” The reporter requested.

“I’ve told this story many times,” I pointed out, then lowered my eyes to the campfire in front of me.

“Not to me, not to me readers,” she persisted, “I would think they would want to hear it from you.”

I cleared my throat and looked back up at her. My eyes gazed at her, but my eyes shifted to a memory many years ago. I took a deep breath.

“It was much like a day like today. I was only a boy of 12. The fall foliage had been sprinkling the paths through the woods for a few weeks. The leaves made crisp crunches under my feet as I ambled. Some of the trees had shed all their leaves and resembled old men rather than bare deciduous. Both the creek and the ponds were rather shallow. After all, Father always said that one knew when winter was upon us when the air temperature was below freezing and the ponds were full. I was walking through the woods welcoming the shards of sunlight that managed to shine through the Indian summer stained-glass canopy of the trees. The sunlight warmed my cheeks. I closed my eyes to embrace the sun’s rays a little more and felt myself smile. I opened them and made a delighted sigh. My nostrils caught a whiff of dried maple as well as the sweetness of a nearby apple tree. A gray squirrel rippled across the path in front of me. The light chatter of birds and chipmunks was a busy city street of activity.”

“I had come to a section of the woods near the creek that was predominantly walnut. I was humming a tune I had heard on the radio that morning, something by Roy Orbison, allowing my mind to wander as I broke open the brown and green soft shells of the walnuts that dotted the ground in front of me.”

“You know how it feels when you can feel someone watching you? Well that’s what I felt. More of an instinct to raise my eyes and possibly see someone’s gaze upon me. I looked up, expecting to see one of my cousins or maybe the wide curious eyes of a deer. However as I glanced around, I became a little apprehensive when I didn’t find anyone. My eyes drifted to the autumn baked canopy above me. The light breeze that had been tickling my cheeks had stopped, making the air a curtain of silence. I looked around. Nothing stirred. The normal chatter of the woods had gone deafeningly quiet. I gathered up the small black brain-like nuts in the bag I had with me.”

“I wandered closer to the shallow creek bed when I felt a shift in the still air, causing me to raise my eyes to the path. A silent barn owl sat perched on an elm branch. His plumage radiantly beamed against the fall foliage with his heart-shaped face and coal-like eyes. I looked up and smiled. “Isn't it a little late for you to still be awake?” I asked with humor in my voice.”

“I lowered my eyes back to the path. There standing on the path was a figure that could have very well walked out from behind the basement stairs or crawled out from underneath my bed. Fear coursed through my veins like venomous cement, rooting me to where I stood. It took me what seemed like hours to comprehend what I was gawking at. There among the bright kaleidoscope of fall colors was this black-uh, shape”

I lowered my eyes to collect my thoughts as the reporter sat there quietly and patiently.

“At first, I thought I had drifted off to sleep and something awful had entered my mind while I slept. It was a horse and rider; I deduced. However it looked more like one entity rather than two,” I took a deep breath trying to calm the rush I could feel just picturing it in my memory.

I took another breath. The exhale came out shakily. The next words came out in a rush. “There wasn’t a head. No hood to enclose a face. No way to identify my immediate visitor. Just narrow shoulders and not even a neck. Narrow shoulders directed toward me. I realized then that the rider was female. Something about the way she sat astride her freight train black horse or her slender shoulders. I just understood in the depths of me that she spurred an undeniable fear that coldly wrapped its fingers around my heart and squeezed with one hand while the other around my windpipe and tightened every time I gasped.”

“I have read Greek myths. She was a fury, a creature of pure rage and wrath. Although panic shook me like a rag doll, I still contemplated what I had unwittingly done to wrong this cloaked creature in front of me. I debated on reasoning or running away.”

“With not another moment’s hesitation, I dashed forward. I barrelled so blindly that I fell into the creek and ran down the length of it because the far embankment was too high for me to climb it. I slipped on one of the smooth creek stones, soaking myself from head to toe. My clothing gained 50 pounds of freezing metal. I felt a sting in the tip of my left elbow, and pain that radiated all the way up to my shoulder. I paused as I picked myself back up, and I could hear shod cantering hoof beats. They clapped clearly against the defined path. I didn’t dare look to my right, just kept half running the other half stumbling upstream. Finally I made it to where there was no embankment and made it out of the creek dragging my saturated carcass. I didn’t look back even when I heard the splashes behind me. When I made it to the little bridge, I thought I was far enough away to look back, but as my feet were on the far side of the bridge I felt the boards shift beneath me. My heart jumped into my throat, making it impossible to breathe as I bolted uphill. I tumbled where part of the path had eroded and heard an audible ‘pop’ in my ankle.”

“I yelped in pain as sheer jagged agony hobbled me instantly. I hopped one leg up the hill and planted my face on the side of the path where there was small gravel. A new sting erupted from above my eye. I turned over on my back, accepting my fate. Feral thunder drummed from her horse's hooves as she and her kelpie ran up the hill after me.”

I took another deep breath and a drink of my sweet tea as I paused before continuing again. “The black horse reared and the rider stayed on. The horse’s breath came out in a thunderhead in the nippy air. It’s obsidian mane resembled black teeth tearing against the colorful woods. The kelpie pawed the air, reaching its front legs for me. I was there, powerlessly paralyzed against the ground. The equine returned to four feet, launched forward, and ran right for me.”

“I don’t know how I stood up,” my voice came out with a tremble, “but I did. I ran all the way to Granny’s house. I ran through the door and slammed it behind me. She was about to get Granddaddy’s shaving strap after me for tracking mud in the house and slamming her door. But then she realized I was bleeding and shaking and frozenly wet.”

“‘What happened son?’ She asked gently. And I told her everything, even though I knew she wouldn’t believe me. Even though she was going to skin me alive. I told her everything.”

“She was quiet for several minutes. ‘No one has seen Millicent, in a long time,’ she said finally.”

“‘Who’s Millicent?!’ I demanded.”

“‘Millicent, Millie, was a girl who lived down the road. She and Mother would go riding together. She was an incredible rider. She was the eldest of 5 girls. Very beautiful from the pictures I’ve seen of her,’ Granny said in a soft voice.”

“I asked Granny what happened to her. Granny became very unsettled. ‘She and her whole family was murdered,’ she whispered.”

“And what, they couldn’t find her head?’ I asked as I pictured the void on her shoulders where her head should have been. I had spent the last several minutes trying not to recollect what I saw but now I could picture every detail of what she wore. The flexes in her horse’s neck. The overwhelming cascade shadow of mane as her devil equine’s eyes bore from under it.”

I palmed the empty cup in my hand.

“Did they not find her head?” The reporter asked me, encouraging me to finish.

I sighed. “No, they found her head,” I paused, “they never found Millie’s body”.