"You never did, nuthin’ but a buncha whores," his buddy said, swilling beer. "Ain’t no one wanna be around you a long time now."
"Once, I said once," the old man said grouchily. "I was young once, not like this." He thumped a gnarled fist against his thigh.
His buddy snorted, spitting a wad of tobacco into the fire. The fire flamed, a bright orange streak that crackled and popped, pine boughs still thick with spring sap. Outside the ring of fire, their bedrolls were rolled tight against the ground’s damp chill. In awhile they would rise, pull the bedding close to the fire and sleep.
But not now. Now they were talking, beating back the edges of the night.
The beer drinker, Gary, could have gone to sleep. He was tired, and more than a little drunk. But there went Harold, telling another one of his damn stories, this one about a woman. Having been many months without one himself, Gary felt he should at least listen to the old man’s yarn. Hell, maybe it would inspire him. The ole trouser plow hadn’t been doing its usual morning stand up and salute routine for a long time now. Gary sighed and threw another log in the fire. "So tell your damn story already."
"I had a love once," Harold repeated. "When I was in the Navy. I was on leave during the War, the big one – you know I was in the war?"
"Yeah, yeah," Gary said testily. "I know. Get on with it."
"I was on leave, was going ashore after four months at sea. We docked and, well – you know how your legs feel after that much time on the water? I staggered around like I was drunk, knocked into this pretty little thing, standing by the gangplank….it was like she was waiting for me."
"See, I tole you. Nuthin’ but a whore," Gary grumbled. "Whores stand by the docks like that -- "
"No, she wasn’t a whore," Harold said sharply. "She was this itty bitty thing with these big, soft boobies," he said, making a wide circular motion on his chest, gripping the fabric of his faded flannel shirt.
"Yeah?" Gary was getting interested. He liked big soft boobies, even on whores. Whores at least let you touch them.
"Well now, me and her went walking out the shipyard like we knew each other forever. I tell you, it was like she was waiting for me."
Gary snickered. "Waiting for your wallet, most likely."
Harold stared him down. "We talked. We walked. We went out to dinner, and later on I took her home, well, she was living in a boarding house, and so we went round back."
"And?" Gary could feel a stirring inside his pants. He shifted in anticipation.
Harold’s eyes were softer now: He was hearing something sweeter than the soft call of crickets in the woods; smelling something muskier than his own unwashed body; tasting something finer than the stale beans and bread and beer he’d had for dinner. "I kissed her. She let me, pulled me in real close, crushing those big soft" – gesturing again – "boobies against me. She tasted good, and, oh, she felt – I felt…" Harold made a pumping motion, clenching and releasing his withered fist.
"Go boy," Gary rasped, giving himself a furtive rub.
Harold looked at him sourly, shook his head. "She made my heart pound, I felt alive, like I never saw the moon or stars before, or the dew on the grass. I kissed her, we kissed, a long time. Then she was gone. Went inside. I went back to the ship. It was only a day leave, we sailed the next day."
Gary looked at him in angry disbelief. "You didn’t do her? You bought her dinner and kissed her and that was it?" He sat back thinking it would be real lonely in his sleeping bag tonight. "I thought you said you had you a woman once. Hey yeah, she was some whore Harold, got a dinner out of you and gave you a lousy kiss goodnight. You’re dumber than rocks, you think that -- "
Harold looked at him, through him. "Hush now," he said, a dark tone underlining the mild words. "You just be quiet. You think a woman is a whore no matter what she does. You never had a woman before--"
"Yeah, and neither did you if you think that’s all there is to it!"
Harold closed his eyes and stroked his beard. "I about had enough of your dirty mouth. I tell you, I had a love once. Now let me finish my damn story."
Gary snorted, then looked closely at Harold. The firelight tattooed his face with flickering shadows. Harold’s eyes were still dark with the memory of that long-ago kiss.
"So finish," Gary said, picking up his beer.
Harold said, thoughtfully: "I wrote her a few times. She never wrote me back, but it was hard to find me, out on the sea. It never bothered me that she didn’t write – I knew how I felt, knew I was gonna see her again someday.
"When the war was over, I sailed back to England, got off on that same dock – I was hoping. Thought I saw her too, but it was a misty day and next time I looked she was gone." Harold laughed at himself. "She didn’t know I was coming, why did I think she’d be there? Some wishful thinking, but I was a kid then, dreaming someone would be waiting for me on the docks the day the war ended."
Gary nodded, remembering a time when he’d loved a girl like that. Then he took another slug of beer. He’d been a kid then, too. Now he knew better.
Harold continued, speaking softly: "I headed over to that boarding house, to ask after her. She wasn’t there – hadn’t been there in….a long while." He paused again, hesitating.
"Go on you old coot. Where’d she go?"
"Was an old boarding house," Harold said by way of explanation. He stood suddenly, grabbed another beer. Popped the top and drank deeply.
Gary swilled more beer himself, then spat in the fire. "You’re making this up, damn you. You ain’t had no love! You ain’t never had nuthin’ since you left the Navy."
"No one been living in that boarding house since 1915," Harold said suddenly. "1915. That woulda been the first one, the first war…I was in the second."
Gary gave Harold a queer look. "What are you saying?"
"The place was abandoned, old. Falling down. No one lived there for a long time. No one coulda lived there, you know?" he said earnestly. "Not even us, Gary – I tell you, it was a mess. I thought at first a bomb hit it, the chimney had collapsed, the roof was bent up like firesticks, you know?"
Silent again, Harold pondered the fire. "I been there, before – just a year before. Stood in the damn yard under an oak tree and kissed that girl. The house was fine. A big white place, with a fancy porch. It was fine. Fine. Then she went in the back door, kinda drifted away, and…I never saw her again."
"I don’t -"
"That house couldn’t change so much in a year, now, could it?"
"Unless it was bombed."
"I thought that too, maybe, yeah, it would make sense. Except it wasn’t bombed. It was just old, falling down: The rest of the houses on the street were pretty beat up too. Like no one been living in that area for a long time."
Gary tossed his empty beer can aside and spat again. "Go on already Harold, we’re outta beer and I want to get some sleep."
"Shush now. I’m getting there. I asked around a bit more, knocked on some doors, went to a few pubs. After a few days, I found her."
"Yeah," Gary snorted. "Probably married and had a houseful of kids. Probably was married the whole damn time."
Harold shook his head. "Cemetery."
"My second choice." Gary laughed, loudly. "Yeah Harold, good ghost story. I’m going to sleep now." He spat into the fire again, then stooped over his bedroll. "I gotta admit, you had me going there for a minute." He laughed again, shook his head. "Chrissakes, haven’t had a camp fire ghost story in a long time, since I was a boy. Whooo-Whooo! Hope I can sleep tonight!"
"Me, too," Harold said softly. "I ain’t done with my story yet. Ghost story or no, I ain’t done with it. And…it ain’t done with me."
Kneeling on the bedroll, Gary looked up. "You had your fun Harold. You got me going, thinking you were gonna tell me about a time you got some good sauce. You told me a real good ghost story instead. So lay off it now and let’s get some sleep."
Harold tugged at his lower lip. Stubbornly, he said, "I ain’t done yet, and now that I started it, I got to tell it all."
Gary flapped his hands at him, a dismissive gesture. But Harold ignored it, mumbled something.
"What?"
"I talked to a few folks, weren’t you listening? They told me about her – about Marlene. Her name was Mar-lene." He sang her name, softly. It was a sigh to his tongue, like the breeze in the trees.
"She was living in that boarding house in 1915. It got closed down after the war, but – she was being courted by a sailor, apparently just crazy for him, and him for her. She hung out at the docks most days, I learned. Before work, after work, a few hours every day, waiting for his ship. That’s where she was the day she found out he died. There’d been a battle, the whole ship went down. Whole crew was gone.
"Ship was the Minotaur," Harold added, speaking slowly, meaningfully.
The two men sat in silence for a long moment.
"And?" Gary was caught again, in spite of himself.
"Well, she couldn’t believe he was gone, so she kept on waiting for that damn ship. But it never came. I heard she came to the dock day after day, staying longer and longer, until she was actually sleeping there. She wasted away, caught a chill and died." The old-fashioned words sounded odd dropping from Harold’s lips, yet came with a gentle dignity.
"I saw her grave, read her headstone. Mar-lene," he said again, whispering her name like a talisman. "But folks say it didn’t end there, they say she’s still waiting there for the ship, for her beau to come walking down the gangplank."
Gary felt a stab of uneasiness. Even if this was a ghost story, and hell, he’d heard a dozen like it in his day, Harold was telling it well. A thought occurred to him, making his heart pound: "Hey Harold, what was the name of your ship?"
"Minotaur. A U.S. ship, not British, but…I guess that didn’t matter." His rheumy eyes narrowed. "Funny how we both had ships the same name, isn’t it?"
Gary nodded, a small shiver teasing his spine. Then he had another thought:
"And you – did you look like – him?"
Harold laughed, a rueful sound. "I talked to enough people, finally saw a picture of him and her together. Gave me a turn, yeah, we looked alike…Enough to fool her ghost anyways."
Gary spat. Laughed, an uneasy jagged sound. He stared around the woods, at the moon caught in the branches of a sycamore. "I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t believe your story. I think you're drunk off your ass – but – if I did, how could you fool a ghost?"
Harold shrugged. "Ghosts are just dead people. They see what they want to see, just like when they were alive."
Gary pondered this, shook his head. "Harold, you did it again. Told me a real good ghost story, and you were right, you just had to finish. Now you did, so lay down and go to sleep." He kicked open his sleeping roll, pulled off his worn boots and lay down.
"I went to the cemetery," Harold repeated. "Found her headstone. Read the dates. Gary, she’d been dead nearly 30 years when I saw her."
"Quit the damn story now Harold, I’m on to you."
"No Gary. Listen to me. I went to dinner with a ghost. Held her hand. Talked to her like I’d known her forever – and then kissed her. Gary," he said urgently. "I fell in love with a ghost, and she fell in love with me. Or was in love with me already."
"So what happened at her grave?" Gary asked tiredly. "Was she there waiting for you, arms open wide, long hair blowin in the wind?"
"No."
Gary snorted, spat.
"I cleaned it up a bit, put flowers on it. The headstone was crumbling, so when I left I took a small piece of it with me, just to remember her by."
"But she wasn’t there," Gary repeated.
"No, she was waiting for me at the docks when I went back to my ship."
Gary bolted upright, peered at Harold over the dying fire. "What the hell are you talking about?"
Harold smiled, his eyes shining at the memory. "It’s like I told you, I had a love once. She was beautiful and sweet. She was waiting for me, with open arms. I pulled her close, held her – kissed those red lips, felt those wonderful soft boobies again….It didn’t matter that she was dead. I was in love. Stayed that way all my life."
Gary peered at Harold over the dying fire. "Even now?"
"Even now."
"She here?" Gary asked dubiously, looking around the campsite. He plucked at his sleeping bag; he couldn’t tell if Harold was kidding or not this time.
"Always. She’s a real cuddler, Mar-lene is, sleeps next to me every night."
"You drunk old coot!" Gary howled. "That’s three times now! You tell a good story, but I’ve had it with you. So shut your damn mouth and go to sleep!" He flopped down again, closed his eyes. "Damn you and your damn ghost stories," he muttered. "We’ll be dead by morning…that’s what I used to believe as a kid, hearing stories like that before bedtime."
Harold sighed. Nudged Gary with his foot. "I worry about what’ll happen to her when I die."
Gary’s eyes flew open, he groaned impatiently. "What the hell are you talking about now? You think you’re gonna die?"
"Of course I do, dammit. I’m old, lots older’n you."
"So then you’ll be a ghost, have her all the time to keep you company."
Harold shook his head, irritated. "I don’t think it works that way, I think she likes the living, don’t think I’ll ever see her again when I die," Harold said sorrowfully. "She’s been the love of my life all these years – and I don’t want her to be lonely when I’m gone."
"Ghosts don’t get lonely. They’re dead," mumbled Gary. He looked up at Harold again. "They’re dead. You’re alive." He yanked the bag over his head, stretched his legs down to the bottom. He was warming up now, drifting off to sleep.
"Gary, I want you to do something for me -- "
A loud groan barked from the bedroll.
"I want you to take care of her. Mar-lene. When I’m gone."
The black sleeping bag wiggled then, and Gary’s head peeked out. "What? What did you say? You want me to take care of your lady love? Your ghost?"
Harold nodded, slipping his hand in his back pocket. "Let me --"
"Dammit! Harold whatsa matter with you anyway? You keep adding and adding on to this damn ghost story like it was real or something. It ain’t real. I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t believe your story. I don’t believe ya gotta rock from her damn grave. Only rocks around here are the ones in your head!"
"Gary – let me explain."
"No. No. Let me." Gary dragged himself upright again. "You are drunk and crazy tonight. Drunker than I ever seen you – lie down dammit and go to sleep. You’ll be all right in the morning." He flopped back down, burrowing into the bag. This time he yanked the zipper up, encasing himself in a down cocoon. Only the top of his head was showing, a dark clip of hair. A few moments later, Harold could hear the first ragged snore.
Harold paused, deep in thought. He pulled a piece of granite from his pocket. It was small and gray, rubbed smooth from years of being caressed and cosseted in every pair of pants he’d ever worn. "I sure do love you Mar-lene," he whispered. "But I got to be going on now."
He looked over at Gary. "I’m gonna leave her with you. You’re a rotten grouch, but I think you’ll do right by her."
Gary snorted, kicked in his sleep.
Harold set the rock next to Gary, tucking it down between his neck and the bag’s flannel sides. He stood, looking down for a long moment.
"Stay warm, my sweet," he whispered. Then he gathered up his things, and walked quickly away. In a few days he would be found, an empty husk of a man, curled up next to a cold fire.
Meanwhile, Gary dreamed of a woman. She had long dark hair. Green eyes set in an oval face. Full red kissable lips. And boobies. Big soft boobies that he could play with as long as he wanted. He did, and the dream became real, so very real, that Gary imagined soft legs wrapped around him, a thrumming release that left the inside of his bag damp and smelling of lilies and musk.
In the morning, he awoke slowly, his mouth dry and flat, tasting like the dregs of sour beer and overcooked beans. Gary opened his eyes, squinted at the cold, gray light. Not quite sunrise, another hour to go, he thought dimly. He shifted, felt the damp spot, shifted again, dragging his bare legs across – and – the thought pulled him fully awake. Why'd I take my pants off? he wondered. Then he touched the damp spot again. Raised his fingers to his nose, sniffed. A flutter in his groin told him, reminded him, of what he already knew. The scent of a woman. In his bag.
Gary bolted upright, thrusting his head out of the bag's tightly laced opening. The chill air made him catch his breath. He blew frosty donuts into the air as he groped in the bag, finding his discarded sweatshirt and jeans. Wiggling, struggling, he pulled them on, then unzipped the bag. His socks were still on, and his boots were right where he'd left them. Jamming them onto his feet, yanking the laces, he looked around the camp, scanning for Harold. Finally staggering to his feet, he yelled. "Harold! Hey Harold! Where the hell are you?"
He stumbled, still slightly hung over. He squatted by the fire, hands fumbling as he pulled together newspaper and kindling. Striking a match along the side of his boot, he finally got it lit. He looked around again. "Harold! You takin' a piss?"
A crow scolded him for his early morning shouts.
"Yeah, you shut up yourself!" he shouted back, waving his arms for emphasis. The crow flew away, black wings fluttering against the brightening sky.
Gary rubbed his eyes, and made for the trees himself. Yanking his jeans open, he peed against a spill of rocks and ferns. Turning back to camp, he realized that Harold's gear was gone. Gary spun in a slow circle, trying to see if Harold was in sight. But the dense trees blocked his view down the valley, and the gray sky yielded no telltale smoke stripe. He sniffed, checking for the god-awful odor of Harold's cooking. Nothing.
"Harold!" he roared. He clutched his ears and groaned, sinking to his knees as the headache pounded his head like an hammer on steel. He crawled to the fire, squatted beside it. He dug around in the cooler and found a beer bobbing in the slush of melted ice and moldy food wrappers.
"Ah! Missed one!" Gary crowed, pulling it out and shaking the extra water off. Popping the top he took a slug; the alcohol soothed his spinning head and he could think more clearly. He fell against the cooler, closing the lid with a snap. He stretched his boots toward the fire, thought about last night.
"You son of a bitch," he muttered, thinking about the ghost story Harold had told. And how he'd asked Gary to watch out for Mar-lene. "Damn, I guess I did watch out for her alright," he said aloud, his self-satisfied grin dying when he realized he'd dreamed of having sex with a ghost. His fingers twitched. He looked down, raised them again to his nose. It wasn't a dream, he thought queasily, hell I've gone and fucked a ghost.
His heart pounding, this time with a mixture of fear and longing, he stood up again. "Harold! Harold! Where the hell are you?"
Gary tramped around the campsite, looking for tracks, for signs of Harold or his gear. After a quick search, he turned back, thinking he'd warm up, break down camp and look some more. He can't have got far in the dark, he told himself.
"Damn you, you crazy coot, you and your talk of dying!" he shouted then, mindless of the throbbing pain that banded his head like an iron wreath.
By now the fire was burning steadily. Gary walked towards it, skirting his open sleeping bag, when something caught his eye. He stopped, and looked, his jaw going slack.
It was a stone, a small gray stone. It was smooth and rounded, as if the edges had been polished off. It no longer looked like a chunk of granite from a headstone, more like a pebble from some sandy beach.
"Harold?" Gary's voice shook a little. "Harold, what is this, some kind of joke?”
Gary knelt down, afraid to touch the stone. He squinted at it, then sniffed. It smelled like lilacs and musk and made him think of lace stockings and smooth thighs. He studied his fingers again, the rumpled insides of his sleeping bag. He gently picked up the stone and slid it into his pocket.
by Susan Rich, (c)2014 All Rights Reserved
