Cold Stairs
Mark Petersen
Published by Mark Petersen at Smashwords
Copyright 2011 Mark Petersen
Cover designed by Kyle Stevens
Special thanks to my friends and family, specifically Bill Whalen and Jeff Stanford.
Also, much thanks to Jeff Mann and the Virginia Tech English Department for recognizing me with an award.
Thank you for downloading this free ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.
This story is dedicated to those brave men and women who provide our country with coal and energy.
It is also dedicated to the people of Eastern Kentucky, thank you for a great summer.
***
Harlan County, Kentucky is a land steeped in tradition, legend, and lore. It is a land where men are tough and death is brutal. Daily, men risk their lives in the sulfurous, black bowels of the earth to produce coal, the lifeblood of the region. Black and brittle, the coal is drawn out of the ground on grisly steel conveyors in exchange for the blood and sweat of men. Extraordinary men, who descend into and rise up from hell countless times. Men who work under the watch of Death, who may at any time use his scythe to pry a slab of slate from the roof to seal a miner’s fate.
In the short time I was there I seldom saw the sun. The mountains cast a shadow across the land for most of the day. The few hours the sun did shine, I spent inside those mountains. I worked in the mines, underneath the mountains, in darkness darker than the darkest of nights. I will never forget the stories I heard. I heard stories of murder and riots, fires and floods. I heard stories of great men, stories of evil men, and stories of ghosts. I present to you one such tale, as told to me by a Harlan coal miner.
***
He awoke with a throbbing headache; his entire body ached. He was dizzy and fighting for breath. If it wasn’t so bright he might have assumed he had been buried alive, but as his eyes slowly began to focus he came to realize he was lying on a hardwood floor. Face to face with a hardwood floor. He turned his head over with great pain to see not a mound of dirt over his body, but his leather recliner, all torn and bent out of shape. He grabbed the banister at the bottom of the stairs with both hands and pulled himself out from underneath the wreckage. He stood up slowly, still dizzy, and rubbed his hands over his arms and legs assessing the damage and making sure nothing was broken. The gash in his leg was still running; the cut looked fresh. He must have just fallen.
I fell down the stairs. Well, that made sense. He had fallen asleep upstairs and now he was downstairs.
I fell down the stairs in my sleep. That made considerably less sense. He had never sleepwalked as far as he knew, and somehow the chair had fallen with him. In fact, he remembered he had set the chair up in the corner of the room opposite the stairs. The more he thought about it, the less sense it made. His head throbbed.
I seem to be ok. I better go stop the bleeding and wash out these cuts. He took a small step toward the bathroom and lost his balance. He felt dizzy and slightly nauseous.
Oh God! I might have suffered head trauma, should I be standing? Who’s going to help me? I’m home alone in a new house and I don’t even have the phones hooked up yet! He began to panic.
“My name is Ryan Tucker. I am 22. I live in Harlan County Kentucky. I’m a drafter at the coal company. I’m engaged to Ronnie. My father bought this house as a wedding gift.” Suddenly he realized he was speaking out loud. Noticing his speech was clear and his memory was intact reassured him. He took a deep breath and made another step towards the bathroom. His head still throbbed, but the dizziness was clearing up a little. A few more steps and he clicked the light on and stared at himself in the mirror. His eyes were still, not darting everywhere like he supposed they might if his head was seriously hurt. His pupils seemed appropriately dilated. He guessed he was fine. After a glass of cool tap water most of the dizziness went away and the headache began to subside. He cleaned up his cuts and inspected his bruises. Stepping out into the foyer he remembered the strangeness of the situation.
I fell down the stairs in my sleep! He glanced upstairs at the dormered wooden ceiling of the upper bedroom. Other than a few scuff marks on the stairwell walls everything looked perfectly normal.
I loved that chair, dammit. Ryan kicked at the splintered wood and torn leather that had been his chair and winced in pain. Carefully climbing around the chair Ryan made his way upstairs and looked around. It was empty, as it had been last night (excluding the chair he lugged up before falling asleep, of course). There was nothing suspicious or unusual about the room at all. He poked his head in the small bathroom and closet. Again, nothing. He turned to head back downstairs and felt a cold chill run the full length of his spine, beginning on the lower back and pushing up past his head, making his hairs stand on end. He could feel a pit form in his stomach and his throat lock up. His heart thudded in his ears as he strained to hear, afraid to turn to see what was behind him. After what felt like a full minute, but was probably closer to two seconds, Ryan mustered up the courage and spun around. Nothing. Just the wood floors, warm yellow walls, and sunlight bursting in through the banks of windows.
What was that? Am I that paranoid? I’m like a child afraid of monsters in the closet. Ryan always tried hard to be a man like his father, Jim. Ryan had a job, and now he had a house, and it wouldn’t be long before he had a wife. He had to be a man, but every now and then he felt like a boy underneath it all. He felt like he was just pretending, fooling the world. A lot of the time he could fool himself too. It was only when he jumped at monsters or daydreamed about being a super hero that he realized it was just an act. He looked down, there were still goose bumps fading on his forearms.
Grow up Ryan. Jim wouldn’t be such a pussy. Jim was a big man, a hard man. He worked his whole life in the mines and still seemed to have many more years to go. At first glance, Jim looked like he was pretty fit for his age: muscles bulging out his white tee shirts and a youthful spring in his walk, but when one realized he was only forty he looked old. Jim wore an old face, weathered by the pressures of raising an unplanned child right out of high school, his career in the mines, and all the beatings he got as a kid raising hell with his buds as a teenager. Jim was tough as nails. Ryan wasn’t. Ryan never raised hell, he never even got in trouble at school. In fact, he had done exceptionally well in school. He even made it into college and attended a full year before dropping out. It wasn’t that his studies were too hard, he just didn’t fit in. He hated being away from home and he didn’t see the sense in wasting his father’s money doing something he hated. Jim pulled some strings at work and got Ryan a job doing CAD work in the office with the white collar boys. It paid well and suited Ryan a lot better than mining. He wasn’t like Jim.
Ryan sighed and gathered up the remains of his chair and put them by the curb with the trash.
After a quick breakfast Ryan washed up, hoping to make himself more presentable. Jim was coming over to help him move stuff upstairs and Ryan didn’t want to explain how he’d gotten all banged up. After a shower he looked a lot better, but the bruises were still plenty obvious. Ryan prepared a lie as he continued unpacking cartons in the kitchen waiting for his dad. About halfway through unpacking the first carton, Ryan heard Jim’s fist rapping on the door. Ryan shouted, “Come on in!” as he stood up and walked toward the foyer.
“Well, what do you think of the place?” Jim said, looking around with his hands on his hips, obviously proud of the gift he had gotten his son. It wasn’t especially large, but it was in good condition for having been built during the coal boom in the 1920s. It was made completely of brick, with a recently re-shingled roof. After entering the front door one was greeted with stairs leading up, a small living room to the left, and a powder room and small laundry to the right. Behind the living room was a small kitchen with an even smaller sunroom towards the back. In the other corner was a small bedroom with its own small bathroom. Upstairs was one large bedroom with its own bathroom and a beautiful gabled wood roof. Topping off the property was a large yard backed by lush forest.
“Oh, it’s great Pop. Incredibly generous of you. It’s perfect and I know Ronnie is going to love it.” Neither Ryan nor Ronnie were supposed to know about the house before the wedding, but Jim had told Ryan early and gave him a key so he could get moved in. Ronnie still hadn’t seen the place.
“It’s a nice place, I’m quite impressed myself. Looks even better with furniture in it.” Jim plopped down on the couch in the living room. “Looks like you got a little banged up there, boy.”
Ryan said the lie he’d rehearsed, which was really only a half lie, “Fell down the stairs moving stuff.”
“Sorry I couldn’t be here yesterday to help, picked up a Saturday shift at the mine. I told you I was coming today. That your recliner all bashed up by the curb?” Jim pointed out the window at the heap.
“That’s what I was moving when I fell down the stairs.” Ryan dodged the truth a second time, but again it was only a half lie.
“We’ll throw it in the back of my truck ‘fore I go and see if I can’t fix it up.” Jim stood, “So what’s goin’ upstairs other than the recliner? This bed over here?”
Ryan hadn’t really thought about that. Originally it seemed obvious that upstairs would be the master bedroom. But did he really want to sleep up there? What might happen if he slept up there again? Probably nothing, but could he be sure of that? No. Something is definitely up there. Why was he so sure of that? I’m so friggin’ paranoid!
“Help me lift it. Come on!” Jim lifted half the bed to his waist and Ryan realized he had totally zoned out.
“Yeah… -uh wait! No. That’s going to stay down here. I was thinking upstairs would be good for Ronnie’s painting, with all the light and windows and such. We can put my desk up there too. And that recliner if you really think you can fix it.”
That makes sense right? Use it as a hobby room? I’ll try sleeping down here tonight, and if that works I can use the downstairs bedroom and upstairs will be a hobby room.
“Good thinking.” Jim set the bed down and lifted half the desk. Ryan squatted down and lifted the other half. The rest of the day they moved and unpacked everything Ryan had not finished the day before. After Jim left, Ryan was exhausted. He fixed a quick dinner then fell into a deep sleep in the downstairs bedroom.
Ryan woke up without a scratch. Maybe nothing had really happened the day before after all. It didn’t change Ryan’s decision about the bedroom though; he liked the idea of having a room for Ronnie to do her painting. The bedroom downstairs was more private anyway, less windows. Ryan washed up, ate a quick breakfast and headed off for work. On his way out the door he glanced upstairs. He could barely see the corner of his desk, right where it should be… Nothing had been flung down the stairs.
What did you expect? There’s no such thing as ghosts. Jim knows that, and you know that too.
The week went by pretty quickly between work and last-minute wedding preparations. Everything was set. The wedding would be the next day and instead of a typical bachelor’s party Ryan was having a big dinner with a few friends at his parent’s house. Ryan preferred the comfort and security of dinner with his family and friends to a rowdy, crude party.
Dinner was quite an affair. Ryan’s mother made her famous roast beef with her prized gravy recipe. There were green beans, fresh corn from a church friend’s farm, stuffing, and buttered rolls, with fresh watermelon for dessert.
After dinner, dessert, and a toast of his father’s homemade east Kentucky shine, Ryan’s friends went home. Once everyone in the Tucker family including Ryan cleaned up the table and dishes, Ryan and Jim went out to sit on the back porch and enjoy the cool night air.
“Big day tomorrow. You ready for it?” Jim took a swig of moonshine from the jar they had opened earlier and offered Ryan some.
Ryan waved his hand as if to say no thank you, “I guess I’m ready. It’s… Well, exciting for sure, and…” Ryan smiled at his father and spoke what was on his heart, “The house is really great dad. I still don’t understand how you pulled that off. I know you wanted to give me the best, and you did, but if you need help paying for it-“
“Hah! It’s a gift Ryan!” Jim chuckled, interrupting. “You don’t need to pay me anything, I’ve got it covered. Enjoy it.”
“Oh, it’s great. I am enjoying it. It’s still a gift even if you need me to cover a little. I have a job that pays pretty well, and you don’t need to be working Saturdays, you’re getting older dad.”
“Put it towards your kid’s college funds, or take Ronnie on a cruise or something.” Jim took another sip of his liquor, “and I’m not getting old, by the way. I’ve got another ten years before I need to slow down. At least. You doubt me? Let’s go. I’ll lay you on your ass right quick!” Jim joked as he punched Ryan’s shoulder playfully. Ryan winced a little because the shoulder was still a little sore from the fall the week before. Jim ignored this and continued, “Besides, I got a sweet deal on that place. Silly people sold it cheap.”
“Silly people?” Ryan leaned forward. “What do you mean silly people?”
“You know, silly folk. Superstitious bat-shit hippies or somethin’. They claimed the house was haunted with, ghosts or goblins or whatever crap they hallucinate smokin’ that shroom-dope stuff.” Jim paused and then added, “Don’t ever smoke that shroom stuff. Stick to regular dope.”
Ryan and Jim looked at each other for a minute and then burst out laughing. They both knew the day Ryan lit up was the day pigs would fly, or hell would freeze over, or -a ghost throws me down the stairs. Ryan felt a sudden chill and hoped it wasn’t noticeable.
“Well, I should head up to bed. Your mother is gonna throw a fit if I don’t get a good night sleep. See ya tomorrow.” Jim patted Ryan on the shoulder and got up to go inside.
“Stay away from that shroom-dope Ryan, seriously.” Jim winked with a chuckle. They both had a good second laugh. As Ryan pulled out of the drive he thought again about the silly people and their ghosts. Ryan plopped into bed, but thoughts about the wedding and about ghost stories bounced around in his head like ball bearings in a blender, and the noise kept him awake.
The wedding went smoothly and Ronnie loved the house. She loved the upstairs room for painting, and she loved the large yard for gardening. Ryan was relieved she didn’t ask why he didn’t put the bed upstairs. He didn’t want to appear childish; he wouldn’t be able to tell her about ghosts because she actually was an adult. She was strong and stable, and though she was only a year older than Ryan she had always seemed much older to him. He admired that in her; he felt they balanced each other out. He decided it wouldn’t be worth it to bring up the possibility of ghosts. She would think it was just one of his games. If anything really were happening they would certainly experience it together at some point and it would be better to mention it then.
A week later he wished he had brought it up. Ryan had a late night on Thursday, getting in his full forty hours for the week so he could spend the weekend camping with Ronnie. When he finally got home at about nine in the evening she was sitting in the family room reading, sprawled out on the couch. As he set his briefcase down he noticed a bruise on her shin, a big bruise, ugly light purple.
“Sorry I’m home so late. What happened Ron?” He sat down on the corner of the couch and pointed at her leg.
“It’s fine. Do we have Friday free?”
“Yeah, the whole weekend!” Ryan sat down next to her, “Your leg?”
“Oh, it’s nothing, I tripped coming down the stairs. Got another one on my shoulder but I’m fine. Definitely nothing to hold me back from camping this weekend!” She set her book down and smiled.
She fell down the stairs…too. Ryan glanced at the stairwell, from the living room couch he couldn’t quite see upstairs, but he felt a chill run up his neck just the same. He was certain something was up there.
“What time are we getting up tomorrow to leave? Hon, you ok? Ryan?” Ronnie leaned forward concerned. Ryan was pale white and seemed to have frozen, staring up at the stairs. “Hon?”
He snapped out of it. “We need to leave now.”
“What? Why?”
“We need to go, grab whatever you need. The lease out on your apartment yet?”
“No, I have another week, but-“
“Just get your stuff. I’ll explain in the car. We can get everything else tomorrow when it’s light outside. We really just need to go.” Ronnie gathered her things and they were out of the house in five minutes.
Ryan told Ronnie everything in the car, about waking up in the foyer, the chills in his spine, what Jim said about the ‘silly people’, everything. Ronnie was silent at the end of the story. Finally, after a moment of silence Ronnie spoke:
“When I started to walk down the stairs I didn’t just fall.” She paused, and Ryan was just about to ask her to continue when she took a deep breath and spoke again:
“I felt something against my shin, as if someone stuck a leg out in front of me as I was walking. I began to lose my balance, and when I looked down to see what I had tripped on I felt a hand on my back give a little push and I fell. I didn’t want to worry you so I wasn’t going to say anything. It seems crazy to me.”
“Not to me.”
Ronnie put her hand on Ryan’s thigh, “I’m not sure I believe anything is really happening there, could be a coincidence. Maybe we’re overreacting. Do you really believe in ghosts?”
“I didn’t think I did.”
“It’s up to you, hon. I trust you.” Ronnie sighed, “What are you going to tell Jim?”
“I don’t know yet. I guess the truth.”
Ronnie leaned back in her seat and glanced at Ryan. She looked worried.
Jim got really angry when Ryan told him everything over the phone. He was astounded Ryan might be a silly person too, and even more surprised when he heard Ronnie agreed with Ryan. Jim was pretty scary over the phone, and Ryan was truly glad he hadn’t decided to tell him in person. After plenty of yelling, and pleading, and more yelling, Jim finally cooled down and agreed to check the place out. They agreed to all meet at the house after supper around nine. Ryan hung up the phone and breathed a sigh of relief. He and Ronnie drove into town for supper; they had left everything in their fridge at the house. When they met Jim at the house they were relieved to see he had calmed down quite a bit. He had had a few hours to think about it, and approached the situation with a clear head. He was still closed-minded of course, but more importantly, he was calm.
“So what’s the plan?” Jim said with a hint of sarcasm in his voice, but even if there was sarcasm he didn’t mean it to be hurtful.
“I don’t know. Ronnie and I don’t feel comfortable in there. It’s… ” Ryan looked toward his feet, when he tried to say “haunted” his throat locked up.
“We’re not completely sure if it’s safe for you to go up there either.” Ronnie said to Jim as she took Ryan’s hand.
“Bull shit. I don’t doubt something happened to you two, but I doubt there is some sort of hell-bent, evil thing up there. Shit like that doesn’t exist; else I would have seen it before somewhere. I’m gonna go check it out. You two can stay here if you like.” Jim walked boldly to the front door. Ryan tossed him the key.
“Be safe dad. Just because you don’t believe in something doesn’t mean it’s not there.”
“Well… If it is there, I’ll kick its ass.” Jim smiled. Neither Ryan nor Ronnie laughed.
Jim disappeared into the house, leaving the front door ajar. Ryan and Ronnie could hear his work boots clomping up the stairs. After a while they heard bits and pieces of Jim trying to taunt the house. “You – get the – here and face – a man!” or “Damn – if you exist – don’t you try – my ass!” Jim went on yelling for five minutes or so, they could see his shadow in the windows, pacing back and forth.
Suddenly the upstairs light went off, and Jim’s yelling ceased. There was a thud, and then another. Finally a series of thuds, each growing louder and big Jim suddenly rolled from the foyer right out the front door in a backwards somersault. He sat there on the lawn dumbfounded, staring into the dark, unlit foyer. Finally, he got up, brushed off his pants and looked Ryan in the eye.
“We’re tearing that son of a bitch down and burning it. We’ll find you a new house.”
“What happened? What did you see?” The front door was still open and Ryan stared into the darkness as he spoke.
Jim was about to speak when suddenly the front door slammed shut. All three of them jumped.
“I’ll be damned.” Jim was still a pale white, eyes wide. “Get in your car, I’ll follow you two out.”
As they pulled out of the drive Ryan looked back one more time. The lights flicked on upstairs, and he snapped his head forward and floored the throttle.
The next time Ryan saw the house was the last time Ryan ever saw the house. Engulfed in flames, the house seemed to be in a state of hellish anger. Jim leaned back against the side of his truck, arms crossed, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. Ryan stood next to him, shoulders hunched, hands in his front pockets. Neither of them said anything the whole time. They watched with a reverent silence, but as the second floor collapsed into the burning frame Jim cracked a faint smile and took a long drag on his cig.
***
The Tucker family still owns that plot of land, grown over with unkempt weeds; it’s roped off with a chain-link fence and marked with yellow NO TRESPASSING signs. The gravel drive is still there, and through the weeds one can see charred bricks along the foundation.
Local children told me if you stand downwind of it you might catch a whiff of wood fire, and if you listen you can hear the faint of roar and popping of invisible flames.
***
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