The Church Factor, written by Neoma Finn. I used to love going to
all those silly little festivals held in small towns and villages throughout the countryside,
you know the ones. They're nearly always named after a fruit or a vegetable
that grows in that part of the world. They consist of contests themed after
the said fruit or vegetable, and food is baked with the same fruit or
vegetable as the main ingredient. A few of them might be named after a
flower or an animal, but they all involve the same types of activities,
and they almost always culminate in a street dance. And I love those darn
things. I'd get off work on Friday night and drive halfway across the country.
If I had to, I'd spend the night nearby and dot to be
the first one to arrive the next morning. They were a piece of Americana
that doesn't exist anymore, the epitome of wholesomeness and honor. And I loved
them right up until the last one I went to. I was in my
twenties back then and a bit reckless. It never occurred to me to tell
anyone where I was going or when I would return. Nor did it ever
cross my mind to ask anyone to come with me. I can't count the
times when I'd be watching a bunch of kids race each other on pedal tractors,
or a group of adults with their hands tied behind their backs and their
faces planted in plates of blueberry pie, and I think, you know,
so and so would have really loved this, But by then I was there
and it was too late to ask. I would have given my right arm
if I had only asked a friend to go with me to this last festival.
It was October, my favorite month of the year. In fact,
it was my favorite day of the year, October twenty first. I had
read somewhere about a pumpkin festival in a small town miles from anywhere that hosted
the most amazing jack o lantern carvings anyone had ever seen. All day long.
Aside from the traditional vendors and events that can be found at all of
these types of festivals, people were invited to carve pumpkins alongside the villagers.
Those who visited were always amateurs compared to the natives, but they were allowed
to enter their jack o' lanterns in the parade that always took place after sunset.
At that point, the car pumpkins would always be placed on hay racks
pulled by Clydesdale's and Belgians, and everyone would get to see the artwork.
There would be the normal array of costumed participants who threw candy out to the
children, along with a variety of floats decorated to celebrate Halloween, which would
be celebrated in Earnest less than a fortnight later. Meanwhile, pumpkin pies and
pumpkin butter, and pumpkin bars and pumpkin anything else would be served from the
booths, alongside apple cider, apple pies, apple crisps, and caramel apples.
Sounded like heaven to me. I was surprised by how remote albert Landing
was. We were in the last decades of the twentieth century by then,
and most towns were either easily accessible via the interstate or at the very least
a main highway, or they had become ghost towns. Neither was the case
here. I had to find a county road that wasn't clearly marked and then
turned down a one lane, unmarked blacktop. It took me four miles through
winding hillsides before it came to a covered bridge, and even though I had
left my hotel early, I didn't arrive until nearly ten am that day.
I had to park my truck in a field and walk across the bridge.
No doubt my truck would have made it through the bridge anyway, but a
friendly man sitting in a long chair by the road stopped me and let me
know that there would be no place to park after I crossed the river.
Well, I didn't mind. The bridge looked like something out of a postcard,
and the river that flowed under it was almost magical. It was like
walking into a Disney movie. The bridge was nothing short of a portal to
another world. The citizens of Alberth Landing were awfully vested in their festival.
Most of them, or maybe even all of them, were dressed in colonial
American clothing, and each of the houses along the street had the appearance of
being well over two hundred years old. A woman was standing in the sideyard
of the first house I came to, casting grain to her Rhode Island red
hens, and they were pecking at it hungrily. Another woman was sitting on
her porch churning butter in an old, old fashioned butter churn, and the
next property had an open sided shd where a man was practicing the art of
blacksmithing. The main part of town was positioned in the crook of the river,
so that as the road I was walking on turned and became main street,
it was taking me right to the river bank. Ahead of me,
I could see a park where booths were set up to sell handmade and home
baked items. Although I was certain I was on the main street, it
was nothing to indicate a business district outside of four buildings where the road I
was walking cross the only other road that didn't look like a cow path.
The four buildings that stood on the four street corners struck me as odd.
The first business was the post office. Despite being housed in a building that
looked like it had stood since long before Paul Revere took up horseback riding,
it had all the modern day signage of the United States Postal Service in the
windows. The signs looked out of place, but not nearly as inappropriate as
the gas station across the road from it. The glass front and store windows
full of signs advertising lottery, tickets and slurpees felt like a time traveler sent
back from the future to warn the world of the hideous fate that awaited us.
Opposite the post office, the caddy corner from the gas station, was
the only one of four buildings that appeared to fit in It was a tavern.
Other than the paps blue ribbon sign in the front window that struggled to
stay lit. It could have been an old inn, with bar maids wearing
dust caps and patrons slashing down tankards of ale while they waited for fresh team
of horses to be hitched to their coach. There was a certain comfort in
that building, even with the flickering light. It felt as rooted as the
oak trees that bordered the park ahead of me, And somehow the thought that
it felt natural made me feel unnatural, as if I didn't belong there.
A voice from somewhere deep inside me whispered that I should turn around and leave.
And since that day, whenever that voice has spoken, no matter how
quietly, I have listened and obeyed. But this day, however, I
did not. It was the fourth and final structure at that intersection that was
the most bizarre, because little festivals like this one, put on by small
towns everywhere, had been a passion of mine for several years. I had
seen my share of out of the way places like snowflakes. No two towns
are exactly alike. It can feel like they are at times, but there
is always something that will set each one apart. It may be a flea
market housed in an old gas station, or a specialty store where the town
creative types make leather goods while the locals watch. Or maybe it's a house
on a hilltop or the founders once lived, or a local cafe that serves
a certain dish unmatched anywhere else. Or wherever it is, there is always
something Likewise, there is one thing that every town of certain size has in
common with every other town of that size. More appropriately, there are four
things. While the typical blink and you'll miss it wide spot in the highway
will certainly have only one or two of these. Any town large enough to
form more than a few city blocks will have a post office, at least
one gas station, one tavern, and one church, and many towns like
this one will have all four at the same intersection. But where a church
should have stood in this town was a big red barn. It was in
immaculate condition. Not one board was out of place. It had a fresh
coat of paint with a gleaming white trim, and the front consisted of a
ground level set of doors that slid open along the wide metal track, directly
under the set of loft doors, over which a pulley for bringing up the
hay that would surely be stored. There. Between the loft doors and the
pulley was a gorgeously painted Amish heck sign in brilliant greens, blues and golds.
Along the side that was visible to me were square windows that were closed
off by hen shutters marked with a white trimmed axe pattern. The barn could
have come straight out of a children's book. Despite its natural beauty, its
location in the middle of town, right where I had expected a church to
be was a bit unsettling. That there was a rope draped across the front
doors with a sign that said no admittance didn't help. I made my way
down to the park. I passed a man who was standing in front of
a massive iron kettle making kettle corn, and whose wife was busy scooping the
finished product into bags and labeling them. A woman was carting wool a few
doors down in front of a yard full of tables loaded with baskets of yarn
and a wide variety of colors. Beyond that was a stand where a young
couple was selling homemade root beer, the old fashioned carbonated by way of fermentation
variety. I had to stop for a bottle. The closer I got to
the park, the more there were people like me, dressed in twentieth century
apparel. There was a family of four waiting in line so the kids could
have a turn on the pony ride. A young couple obviously deeply in love,
paid no attention to anything or anyone except each other, and older couples
walked hand in hand, enjoying the memories of youth that must have been stirred
by the nostalgia of the event. One lady, whose white roots were showing
under her harshly dyed red hair, was holding up a quilt at a booth
and telling the withered old man beside her how her grandmother had made a quilt
using the same pattern and nearly identical colors for her when she was a little
girl, And to his credit, the man was already pulling out his wallet
to purchase it for her. In nervous anticipation, she wiped her hands down
the front of a gaudy white top with large turquoise flowers printed on it.
Near the center of the park was where the real activity was taking place.
Children were gathered around long makeshift tables and carving pumpkins. Adults walked all along
the line and offered guidance wherever possible. Moms and dads cringed that the messes
their children were making, before smiling brightly and congratulating them on their jobs well
done. And then another adult dressed in appropriate period clothing would come along and
direct them away from the table to a place where presumably the children could enter
their masterpiece in the contest that was to be judged later in the afternoon.
Now this was paradise. I couldn't believe how fortunate I was to have found
such a festival. It was everything I ever dreamed of. Booth after booth
sold to items that had been made by hand and were surprisingly reasonably priced.
Along the far edge of the park was a row of gaming booths where visitors
were encouraged to try their hand at balloon darts, the duck pond and a
ring toss at the end of the boost was a dunk tank where the town's
mayor was perched precariously on a lever that would drop him into the water below
if the person throwing the ball hit the target. Periodically, a man driving
a horse drawn wagon would make his way through the crowd, with a handful
of children sitting in the back, and another man towered over everyone on stilts
hidden under extra long pant legs. I saw a tent with a sign that
offered palm readings, beside another tent from which I could hear music. Now
this wasn't the typical Barb Brown howling out of painful renditions of Lenyard skinnered songs
or making poor attempts at being Janis Joplin. The music from that tent was
old beyond my memories. The melodies were both familiar and strange, alluring and
menacing. I visited every booth and examined every piece of merchandise, and purchased
more than I could comfortably carry, and I ate more than my stomach had
room for. I visited the game booths and took a shot at dunking the
mayor before winning a stuff bear at the ring tossed my legs ached and my
arms were loaded down. By the time I made my way back over to
where the children were carving pumpkins, more and more adults were taking seats at
the table and trying their hand at carving. A young girl approached me and
asked if I'd like to buy a pumpkin to carve. I was young,
and my job paid well, and my bills were paid. I wasn't married,
and I had no children. This was what money was made for.
I thought, yes, please, I said, and let her lead me
to an empty spot at the table. And someone held open a bag and
suggested I put my merchandise sent it and set it under the table, and
I obediently did as I was instructed. The young girl brought me a tall
pumpkin and took my payment. She pointed out the carving instructions in jawors in
front of me and asked if I needed any help. I assured her that
I was an old hand at this, and I thanked her before she went
off to find someone to fill the empty spot beside me. I had already
cut open the top of my pumpkin and was scooping out the seeds when the
lady with the garnish red hair, sat down beside me. She flashed me
a tobacco stained grin through lips stained with a bright pink lipstick that was bleeding
down the creases of her mouth. Hazel, she said, excuse me,
I answered, unsure of why she was calling me Hazel. Well, my
name is Hazel. What's yours? Oh, I'm Charlie. I told her,
nice to meet you, Charlie. Have you ever been to this thing
before? The young girl who helped me sat a small, squat pumpkin in
front of Hazel, and it suddenly struck me that she was matching pumpkin shapes
to body types. No, I haven't. I didn't know it existed until
a week ago. Well, me neither. If I'd known they did this,
i'd come every year. I was struck by the little girl quality in
her voice. I'm Martin. Over there, that's my husband, She gestured
over to where the withered old man was nodding off on a park bench.
Martin never likes to go to these things, but he's had so much fun
today. He's like a kid again. And she giggled, and I decided
that I liked Hazel. He says, we can come back next year if
I want to. Well, that's nice, I offered, because I didn't
know what else to say. I looked over at her sleeping husband. He
wasn't an attractive old man. I highly doubted that he had been handsome in
his youth. He bore a full set of acne scars on each cheek,
and his mouth seemed too wide for his thin face, and his nose was
long and hooked. However, I remembered how he had pulled out his wallet
and purchased the quilt for his wife, and I decided I liked him too.
We carved our pumpkins, trading suggestions and offering support as we did so.
Hazel didn't stop talking. She told me about her children and grandchildren.
She talked about a son who died in Vietnam, and another who lives somewhere
out west now, but who always comes home for Thanksgiving. She told me
about the quilt she'd purchased and how much it reminded her of a quilt her
grandmother had made for her when she was a little girl. And then she
told me how she and Martin had planned to travel after he retired from the
factory where he had worked for nearly thirty years, but that they had robbed
him of his pension, and now they couldn't afford to do much more than
go to little festivals like this. And by the time the young girl came
around and led us over to the judging table, I knew almost everything a
body could know about an elderly couple leaving Social Security check to check. There
must have been one hundred pumpkins on the hay racks behind the judges booth.
They were separated into categories by the age of the artists. We were handed
cards on which to write our names, and when we handed them back,
they stuck a sticker on each card with a number and handed us each a
ticket with a corresponding number. The judging would take place in a few more
hours, and if we placed, we would be invited to ride on the
float and carry our pumpkins. I said my goodbyes to Hazel, and I
wished her and Martin good luck, and I went to find more food to
eat. When I finally sat down on the bench where Martin had been napping
earlier, I took a long, hard look around. Most of the pumpkin
carvers were adults. Now the simple toothless grins created by the children were gone.
Older minds were cutting out more devious looking faces with evil, frowning eyes
and pointed, jagged teeth. I watched as first one person in twentieth century
apparel, and then another was replaced by someone who dressed in their period clothing,
began to carve with amazing precision. The initial works were not much more
impressive than anyone else's, but little by little, simple eye holes and gaping
mouths were disappearing. Whole faces were being carved in with tools that weren't on
the table, but were being pulled from inside of pockets. I was amazed
at how realistic those faces began to look. A few were whimsical, but
mostly they were frightened. I saw one carve to look like an angry sea
captain, into whose mouth the artist shoved a pipe when he was finished,
And another face resembled a witch. It looked so alive that I could almost
see her meeting with her sisters in the open scene of Macbeth. Then I
saw a beastly face. The eye was popped out and dangling by cords of
pumpkin guts. Its cheeks were modeled as if scarred by smallpox, and it
was spewing more pumpkin guts from its fat lips. It looked like blood was
trickling from its nose, and I couldn't help but feel that I had seen
that face somewhere, maybe not such a hideous version of it, but definitely
that face, and I decided it must be the artist's rendition of Charles Lofton
as the hunchback of Notre Dame. I was beginning to get tired. Too
much food, too many bottles of the overly sweet root beer, and too
many glasses of apple cider were take making their toll. The judge wasn't due
to start for another hour, but I was imagining my warm, comfortable hotel
room and thinking that no parade would match the joy of crawling into bed.
Another completed pumpkin was placed beside the dangling eye pumpkin. This one had been
painted with pink lipstick and wore a mop of bright red hair. I looked
at the little squinting eyes and thought how funny it was that the two pumpkins,
side by sides looked so much like Hazel and Martin. And it occurred
to me then that it must be a tradition to find people in the crowd
and the car faces to resemble theirs. I looked up and down the line
of the artists to see if anyone was carving my face. None of the
pumpkins looked anything like me. Will you come with me please? I looked
around, and the voice that seemed to be whispering in my ear, the
young girl who had sold me the pumpkin, was bending over the back of
my bench. Are you talking to me? I asked, yes? Can
you please come with me? She was beckoning for me to follow her.
Exhaustion was winning the day. I couldn't imagine where I would ever find the
energy to stand up, much less walk. I shook my head no,
unable to find the words to explain that I was too tired. You've won
a price, she said, you have a spot on the float. Her
smile felt more like a leer. All around us, lights were being lit,
or perhaps torches were being ignited. I couldn't tell which voices were fading
in and out. People were moving about, but it looked more like they
were swaying. I felt dizzy. If you'll follow me, I'll take you
to the float, she said. I don't know if I was too exhausted
to move or too exhausted to disobey. I sat straight up on the bench
and I reached for my back. My body was making up my mind for
me. It apparently thought I had enough energy to follow. My hand reached
the spot where my bag should have been, but there was nothing there.
I have your bag, if you will follow me, the young girl said.
Her voice had a strange, ethereal sound that matched the music that was
still coming from the tent. Come on, she coaxed. It's this way.
The world tilted sideways as I gained my feet, but I quickly righted
myself and I took the first step forward. She was directly in front of
me. Her long brown hair fell down her back in soft waves. Such
pretty hair, I heard myself mutter. We walked through the crowd single file,
and every now and then she would stop and look back to make sure
I was still there. Somehow I was. My head was spinning and my
eyes were losing focus. I was certain that I was going to pass out,
but my feet kept moving forward. We made our way bad back up
the street to the big red barn. In here, she said, sliding
the door open wide enough for me to step through. It was warm inside.
It had been a relatively warm day, but the night at some point,
and I can't remember when it had become night. The night air chilled
everything, including me. The interior of the barn glowed with a golden hue
that one hundred lit candles or a blazing fire would create, and people were
moving around inside. They were all dressed in colonial attire. In front of
me was a woman. Her clothes were from my century, and it told
me that she was not local. She turned to look at me, and
we were both startled to see the disoriented exhaustion in each other's faces. A
voice from somewhere deep inside me whispered, I told you to leave now,
it's too late. I felt sick. There was a strange, nauseating smell
hanging in the air, and I couldn't quite place it. It was thick
and metallic in nature, with undertones of something I could not identify. I
closed my eyes for just a moment. The thud of something heavy hitting the
dirt floor somewhere near me brought me wide awake. I focused on the spot
where the woman had stood only a moment before, but she was gone automatically.
I stepped forward to take her place in line, and as I did
so, I tripped over her body. I need help, someone was saying.
It was the blacksmith I had seen earlier. This one passed out.
Someone helped me lift her. I watched as two other men came over and
half dragged, half carried the woman away. I heard the sound of a
blade swishing through the air and the split of something viscous. The line moved
forward other step. My body ached for release. My eyes wouldn't stay open.
There are always gluttons, someone was saying. Every year there are those
who drink too much root beer and they pass out. It's always the same,
too much root beer. What did he mean? Root Beer is an
alcoholic. It shouldn't make anyone pass out. I tried to count the number
of bottles I had drank that day, Three maybe four. Another swish of
a blade and another splight of thick fluid. The line moved forward another step,
and I followed suit. My mind was telling me to focus. Now.
That little voice wasn't whispering anymore. It was screaming at me to get
out and run, or you're going to die. I forced my eyes open
and took in my surroundings, and people were moving around, stacking large objects
into piles. Little voice was telling me what I was looking at, but
my mind couldn't accept it. The objects were mannequins, I thought, headless
mannequins, and then I recognized a gaudy white blouse with big turquoise flowers on
it. The head was gone, but I knew if it had been there,
it would have had harshly dyed red hair. There were people everywhere around
me. I didn't know what to do. I swallowed a scream and I
forced myself to stand perfectly still. The adrenaline rush completely erased my confusion.
With every ounce of strength I possessed, I forced myself to quit trembling.
I had to get out of there. Another swipe of the blade meant another
step forward, and I moved aside and allowed the man who was behind me
to step forward in my place. No one noticed. I stepped back another
step and let the woman behind him step up. No one saw. The
blade took another head, and the line stepped forward, and everyone except me.
With each beheading, I moved backwards, and finally I was at the
door, and when it opened, the young girl who had brought me there
was pushing another victim through. Now worried that she might have seen me,
but she didn't, and the door closed too quickly. Anyway, the front
wall of the barn was dark, not a sight of My only hope was
to fade into the shadows. If I could keep hidden, maybe I would
find another way out. I slept backwards, and I pressed my whole body
into the shadows. And a few minutes later the door opened again and another
victim stepped inside. I had stood beside that man at the ring toss,
and he looked at me, but he was in too deep of a stupor
to recognize me. And as I stared at him, something behind him caught
my eye. It was the stairs leading to the hayloft. In every horror
movie I've ever watched, the biggest mistake is always to go up when running
from the monster. Don't climb the stairs, don't climb the ladder, and
don't climb the tree. I knew that, but I also knew there was
no other escape. Clinging tight to the dark wall, I made my way
over and quickly ascended the loft. Halfway up, I got a glimpse of
the front of the line there was an altar. I wondered if I could
stay up in the loft for the night and make my escape the next morning.
I felt safe for now. My adrenaline levels were dropping, and I
was beginning to feel the exhaustion seep in again. The hay looked soft and
inviting. I could have fallen to my knees and slept for days weeks.
Even A voice behind me erased that thought there are more bags up here,
it was saying, as it climbed up the stairs behind me. Quickly,
I dove behind a stack of haybelles, and I held my breath. The
owner of the voice was directing another voice to look at the back of the
waft. They rummaged around while I laid as still as I could, and
by the time they found what they were looking for, it was all I
could do to stay awake. Sleep was all I wanted. Once they were
gone, I made my own way to the back of the barn, and
to my everlasting joy, there was a door there. I slipped it open
and I peeked out. Thankfully, no one was back there. However,
there was no way to get down either, and whatever was in that root
beer was playing havoc on my cognitive reasoning. The hay was calling me back
to sleep, and my body was doing its best to betray me. But
I had to escape. I looked around the loft for something, anything,
to help me get down. There was a rope on top of the pile
of bags the two voices had come up to get and I slid the door
open as white as I dared, and I dropped the rope down, hoping
there wasn't a window below me that would reveal the rope and give me away.
I've never been to athletic type. Combined with the overwhelming desire to sleep,
I don't know how I managed to get down, and when my feet
were firmly on the ground, I took off at a dead run for the
covered bridge. I didn't care at that point who saw me. I just
needed to get away. I was running at what felt like a breakneck speed,
but in reality it was little more than a crawl. Street Lights or
torches let my path. As I ran along the street toward the bridge,
it was getting closer and freedom was seconds away. And I knew when I
got to my truck that I wouldn't be going back to my hotel room.
I was going home. I was going to put as much space between me
and this horrible place, these monstrous people, as I possibly could. I
took my first step onto the bridge. A relief flooded my body. My
truck was on the other side, just over the water. I could do
this. My hand reached down to feel for my keys in my front pocket,
and there they were. The bridge was dark, but moonlight illuminated the
opening at the far end. I was going to be safe soon. I
burst through the portal that had led me to that awful place and came to
a staggering halt. My truck wasn't parked in the field. No vehicles were
parked there. The entire field was empty. Overwhelmed by confusion, I looked
back across the river at the little town and a mass of fire burned now
in the middle of the park. Strange music drifted through the air, bringing
with it uncertainty. Was this all a bad dream? When was I going
to wake up? Could I wake up? I turned back to the field
where my truck should have been, and then down the road where freedom waited.
I thought that was running through my mind. Was too horrible to accept
even as I rejected it. I slid down the river bank and began to
quietly make my way along it, hidden from view by underbrush and overgrown trees,
and back to the park, where the fire burned. From behind one
of those tall oak trees that bordered the park, I watched the festivities.
The townspeople were dancing around a massive bonfire where the pumpkin carving tables had been.
All around the fire, on the ground were the headless bodies of a
hundred or more out of towners. Where their heads had once been, jack
o lanterns were now perched. I saw the bodies of Hazel and Martin,
and the man who stood beside me at the ring toss, the family of
four and their two children, and the young couple in love. Each pumpkin
was a grotesque replica of the head that had replaced, the smell of their
body slowly roasting bold in the pit of my stomach. The kettlecorn man was
at the center of the activities. He was dressed now on a white robe
with a hood reminiscent of the types of hoods worn by the ku Klux Klan.
He held up ahead and said something strange over it before casting it into
the fire. I recognized it by the shock of red hair, and everyone
cheered. The Feast of Albrith. By all blessings be bestowed. The man
called the Feast of Albreth, answered his followers. There were more cheers.
He picked up Martin's head and repeated the ritual, and I watched as he
picked up head after a head and repeated his prayer and cast it into the
fire again and again. The villains cheered, and the smell of burning flesh
was so overpowering that I began to feel sick. But at last I emptied
the contents of my stomach out onto the dark grass behind the tree. I
had seen enough. That was a blessing. The medicated root beer came up
with the food, sobering me. With no truck, I saw no reason
to go back the way I came. I knew the river would take me
back to civilization. I had only to follow it. It took me three
days before I saw anything that looked remotely like the world I had left behind
when I crossed that bridge for the first time. I hadn't dared leave the
river until then. I had drank river water and gone without food but I
had gotten away. That was all that mattered now. I reported my truck
as stolen, and I received an insurance check that was big enough to put
a down payment on another one. It wasn't as nice as the first,
but I didn't need a better truck. I wouldn't be traveling around the country
to festivals anymore. My world would never expand beyond my own backyard again. M