After inheriting my great-aunt’s house out in the woods, I immediately set about cleaning it out.
I was stricken by the amount of kids’ clothes in the house—my great-aunt’s two children had not made it to adulthood, and it had been many years since her nieces and nephews or great-nieces and great-nephews, like me and my sister, had been up to visit or had even needed such small coats and jackets for summering or wintering in such seclusion.
Although holding my old clothing brought back warm memories, I had no use for any of it, being single and childless. I decided to imitate what I had seen quite often in the suburban area I had moved away from: During the fall and winter months, warm coats and hats and scarves would appear around town, affixed to fences and poles and benches and even, once or twice, the very last payphone remaining in town. The idea was that homeless people would be able to take them freely, letting them keep warm while still preserving their dignity.
So, one Saturday morning I drove out to the fence that separated my inherited property from the rest of the grass and dirt that flanked the dirt road that was now, more or less, my own. Instead of tying the coats to the fenceposts by their arms, I nailed them up carefully by their inner tags. They would come away from the fence easily if they were tugged on, and the various kids’ names would be destroyed in the process.
This took maybe fifteen minutes altogether, and I got back into my car feeling proud of the work I had done and of the fact that the coats out here could potentially be even more helpful for some poor sap stumbling through the woods than the urban coats I had become used to seeing in my old town.
As I glanced behind me to complete the second point in my three-point turn, I got a start: It seemed six people were already going to be helped.
They were kids marching in a straight line, all in black with black hair, unescorted, leaving the woods right where it abutted the perimeter of the fence. I was gripped with sudden anger at the parents who had sent their kids out into the woods without any bright or reflective clothes or patches, not to mention the total lack of consideration for the local wildlife, especially the species which would see kids as snack food.
Then my eyes adjusted, and I realized it wasn’t just black clothing or hair, they were completely black—bipedal, humanoid, but entirely a flat matte black, otherwise featureless in every way; their bodies were all the same smooth black, undisturbed by the creases and folds of clothes, like unused shopping mall mannequins. Even their heads were round and bald without even the slightest suggestion of hair, eyes, or nostrils.
Transfixed, I watched as each child picked a coat off the fence and shrug it on in a unified ripple. The only variation came from the smallest one at the very end of the line, who had picked up my old orange coat, had felt the matching hat jammed into one of the front pockets, and took it out to place on his own seemingly bald head.
Then they went on their way, bobbing in time, still in a straight line like ducklings after their mother. They walked by the car and soon the tallest of the children disappeared from my sight into the woods opposite from where they had initially emerged.
As the children began to go, I caught sight of a much larger figure emerging from the woods where the children had come from, too.
Although this taller creature, this adult creature, was also matte black with no discernible facial features, it was not entirely smooth like the children. Its body billowed, especially around its head and hips and legs as though it were wrapped in veils or caught in nets. From its head, it also seemed to be emitting a breathy drone, which only increased as it neared the area of the fence where the coats had been.
Without warning, it swung its head around to the car and, despite the fact that it did not seem to have eyes, its glare burned into my head, and its drone raised in volume and pitch until I yowled and pressed my hands to my ears, though I could not force myself to close my eyes or look away.
Seemingly satisfied, it—who I was already starting to think of as ‘her’ even then—rushed to the line of children that had now almost been completely swallowed by the forest, who I am now sure were her children. Through watering eyes, I watched her go.
The littlest one in my old orange winter clothes turned and looked at me over his shoulder as his mother urged him along with an open-palmed push against his back.
Trembling, I kept my foot pressed down on the brake just long enough to fish a cigarette out of the pack in my front pocket and get it lit. After that, until I was back in my inherited home, sitting at my inherited kitchen table, is all something of a blur. Between then and nightfall, I smoked through that whole pack of cigarettes and the next one, getting up and pacing and checking the locks on all the doors and windows over and over in between deep draughts. I moved my home office and a futon up to the attic where there’s a single round window at the front of the house that allows me to see everything on that part of the property quite clearly, but of course would be extremely difficult for anyone or anything to see back into. Whatever I saw, it wasn’t for me—or any human—to see.
At the same time, I can’t help but remember the littlest one looking back over his shoulder at my car, at me—
Maybe I’ll be fine.
