Something in the Woods by Jan Darrow

Long ago on blue autumn nights a fire would appear at the edge of Tucker’s field. A field that met a forest along an unpaved road. Where in that field, shocks of drying corn silhouetted against the darkening sky.

No one knew how they started, but it was useless to put them out because another would start again later. Some were small – others had flames that climbed fifteen feet high.

A legend grew, and for many years people told stories about witches living in the forest nearby, and how they wanted to reclaim the farmer’s land. 

Some people said they heard incantations coming from those deep woods, others told stories of broomsticks flying in the dark above the autumn trees. Some said they saw strangers in town with snake rings and tattoos and eyes the color of fog selling potions.

But there was never any evidence of witches. No relics left behind.

And Jack Tucker grew up with his father planting corn and wheat in that field. A field that lived and breathed under the summer sun.

One Halloween night when Jack was sixteen, his car skidded off the road. He got out and saw that his tire was flat. The moon was so bright it bled into the field and trees beyond. He shivered a little as he walked toward home. If there were witches, he told himself, he’d meet them head on.

The road was silent. Just owls and ravens shifting in the tree branches above.

Jack whistled a song.

Up ahead he saw where his father’s field met the forest. And then he saw orange flames licking the sky. He wasn’t afraid of the fires and crossed the field to warm himself. He stood listening to the crackling wood.

It was only moments later when something jumped upright out of the fire and shook itself to life. Jack’s mouth opened wide. A figure made from bark growled in the orange light. White sparks flew from a snarling head of leaves and caught fire to the grass and bundles of dry corn beyond.

Horrified, Jack Tucker outran the shooting flames only to see the fire swallow his father’s field behind him when he reached home. The fire department came, but it was too late.

In the morning there was nothing but burnt ground for two square miles.

In the years to come, Jack Tucker left the field alone. Thirty years later, you couldn’t tell the difference between the forest and what was once the field.

And by then, the fires were gone.

Jan Darrow has most recently been published by True Chili and Five on the Fifth.  Her book Autumn Poetry: A Collection for the Season was one of 8 Poetry Collections for Sweater Weather featured by the online community - Read Poetry.  (Andrews McMeel Publishing.)