Halloween 2024

Here it is - my annual story for the season. Hope you like it.

Halloween 2024

Before the Floods

            Tree. Free. Me. Tree. Free. Me. Tree. Free. Me. Tree. Free. Me. Tree. Free. Me.

The words floated, they pounded, they jabbed, they sank into my brain as I tossed and turned in bed. My nice, comfortable, too expensive bed. In my very nice house, a mansion really. At a very settled time in my life. Minimal drama. Maximum (for me) relief. Lots to be grateful for. The agonizing was long over. I’d made my decision, now I was going to live with it.

Yep. I was living the life I’d worked so hard to have. A life that was safe now from the turmoil of the world outside of my own little kingdom. I’d made my peace with what I’d done. I couldn’t save them all, so I chose to save none. Now was not the time to throw the proverbial monkey wrench into the works, as my life could be dubbed.

            Why would trees need to be freed? Illogical, and the result of all the bad news that tried to taint my decision to survive. To continue for humanity’s sake. To live to build again, when the world would need me the most. No way I could save the world, so I’d save myself.

            I got up, fetched a water glass, sipped, staring out the bedroom window at the woods bordering the mowed-and-unnaturally-green chemically-saturated grass of the backyard. For late August, the weather was surprisingly cool, and I had to choose between putting on my pajama top or shutting the windows. I chose pajamas. Glanced around my bedroom. Checked out the antique clock on the wall, couldn’t read it by moonlight. Never could, but I always tried on bright nights like this. Checked my phone. It was working, which meant satellites were still circling Earth. Mass destruction was in the distance, I hoped. Two in the a.m. Of course it was. My mind decided I’d had enough rest and needed to get back to work. My survival depended on it. My plans to finish fortifying my beloved mansion. But not this second, I told myself, feeling unsettled by the three words haunting my sleep.

            Sighing, I started to climb back into bed when the words floated through my brain again. And again. I don’t like being hounded by dreams. In fact, I hate it. Giving up, I turned on my bedside lamp and added an afghan to the top sheet. Maybe if I read a few pages, sipped more water, warmed up, I could get back to sleep. Picking up the book I had put down just two hours earlier, I opened to the next page I’d marked. A worn-out, page-tattered copy of an old Dick Francis novel, I had practically memorized its lines. Which was the point. No thought process needed. Just the reassurance of an ethical, fearless, and honest hero. Happy ending. Bad guys get their just comeuppance. Was I the hero or the villain in my own story, I wondered.

            This time the words appeared on the yellowed pages of the paperback. In 20 point Times New Roman. A ticker tape of three repeating words. Rubbing my eyes, I decided I was assuredly not crazy, just work-exhausted. I build. Big buildings. Buildings that dominate the skyline. Buildings that unmistakably say I am here and I will stay with you forever. The same sort of message given off by the pyramids and the Teton mountains. Long after I am gone, the buildings I created will survive. Whenever humanity regains its sanity, that is, I will be remembered.  I’d put the same passion and expertise into creating my safe place, this house that was my refuge.

            The towers I built will be my legacy. I have no family, no children, no relatives left alive. So when I built this mansion on eight acres of forest, I saw it as my offspring. Unlike my superstructures, I injected every corner of this dwelling with my taste, my personality, my flights of fancy. While distinctly modern, it’s filled with antiques I collected from all over the world. My bed is one of my favorites – a four-poster that once held the likes of British kings and queens. I had created a museum of sorts, for future generations to admire, to study, to mimic. For those lucky few who would make it through the coming mass destruction.

            It was going to happen. I knew it as surely as I knew my own name. Noah Holbrook.

            But now, those three damned words were scrolling across the underside of the tester, refusing to let me alone. Tree. Free. Me.

            “Screw it.” Now I was talking aloud. Really smart, I told myself. Throwing aside the covers, I slid my feet to the Persian carpet once more and felt around for my slippers. This called for a drink. Heading downstairs, I hesitated before hitting the button that opened the wall of windows facing the backyard. The moonlight was having an odd effect on me tonight, one I attributed to overwork and overtiredness. I wanted to bathe in its silvery essence. I needed its cold glow on my skin. Before I could strip naked and run around that expensive grass like a crazy man, I hustled myself to the mini-bar in the kitchen and reached for the first bottle. With no idea what I’d grabbed, I added a Waterford tumbler and hauled it and the bottle to the room that opened up to the yard with another touch of a button. Sliding glass disappeared into the side walls as if by magic, an effect that tickled my fancy. Normally. Not now, however. Sinking into my leather recliner, I propped the liquor on my knee and studied my yard before I took a swallow. Before I realized what was happening, the Waterford slipped from my other hand and smashed to smithereens on the marble floor.

            The trees. They’d moved closer to the house. I swear it’s true. Dark, hulking oaks, frothy maples, mundane pines, they all had crept to within a few feet of the patio outside the sliding doors. No mistake about it. I could feel their encroaching energy, their shimmering leaves just waiting to fall at my feet. I took a swig from the bottle, barely registering the taste of the bourbon. I had to be dreaming. Had to be.

            But I felt the heft of the bourbon in my hand. Heard the crunch of broken crystal beneath my slippers as I rose to my feet. I’m a man of power, of authority, of wealth, I told myself. I don’t hallucinate. I face the facts without fear. Before giving myself a chance to think about it, I strode onto the patio, the night-cooled slates beneath my feet soaking dampness through my slippers. Shaking the bourbon bottle at the trees, I thought I’d give them hell. A real talking-to. Wait until I find out who masterminded this little scenario, I yelled at the forest. He’ll get pink-slipped so hard, he won’t be able to find his balls.

            A small dogwood, scrawny and almost leaf-bare, shook its branches at me. Clearly, I was being reprimanded by a junior partner of the forest. Before I could tell it to take its sorry self back to where it had come from, it spoke. “Tree. Free. Me.” At least I thought it spoke, although the words may have been echoing in my brain alone.

            “All of you have the same problem? Well, look at it from my viewpoint. I’m not nuts. So you aren’t here. Don’t care what you say. Tree-free-me, hellfire and damnation. This is a nightmare for the ages, and I’ll wake up just fine. Like always.”

            As I stood there shaking the bottle of bourbon at my nightmare, the trees moved in unison. Roots and all. Lifting the slates, they came to within feet of where I stood. I smelled their greenness, their loamy detritus, and worst of all, felt the rough bark of the branches that reached for me, stroking my head, my face, my shoulders. The bourbon hit the ground, adding to the pungent odors swirling in the moonlight. I couldn’t have cried for help if the fate of humanity depended on it. Shaking, I tried to beat their branches away from me, but they were stronger than I.

            They were pulling me into their forest. Into the deepest, darkest place where no moonshine would ever reach. Helpless to resist, I couldn’t keep my balance and fell, landing on my face on the ground they’d chewed up around me. Dirt filled my nostrils, my mouth, my ears. Yet still I heard those three words. Tree. Free. Me.

            “Alright!” I tried to scream. Soil flew from my mouth. “You win! I’ll do it!”

            Everything stopped. The trees. The sounds. The world. The trees had won. They’d done what my conscience couldn’t. What I’d been begged to do. What I’d told myself was impossible, so why try? Standing, I smoothed down my rumpled pajamas and wiped what I could of the dirt on my face. I spit soil from my throat.

            “You may come in,” I croaked. “Be my guests.”

            Wood cracked, it screeched, it split with a force that equaled that of a thousand bombs. People emerged, all colors, all sizes, all nationalities, squeezing from the interior of the multitude of trees. Blinking, hands outstretched, they gathered around me, touched me tentatively, all silent.

            “I’ve been waiting for you,” I said, realizing it was true. I’d been kidding myself that I could maintain my lifestyle for my own survival. “The ark is ready.”

            Now I knew how the original Noah must have felt. Compelled to build and build and build some more. Opening the door in the hull to whoever and whatever showed up. My mansion, my stocked pantry, my many rooms, awaited what the trees had brought me. When the end came, we would be safe. Safe until a dove brought us the branch of an olive tree, and we could emerge into a world forever changed.

            My legacy would not be my superstructures, after all.