***
After I’d killed some time at the local library, I showed up promptly at noon. Once again people were overscheduled and I was sent out to clean the PlayLand, never mind my apron and gloves meant for the kitchen. Brenda was stocking sauces; she glanced up at my approach. “Feeling better, Noelle?”
“Maybe, hey, I was wondering if you knew of any accidents that happened outside the restaurant.” I stepped into the alcove beside her, propping my broom against my shoulder.
Brenda's brow furrowed, "in 1995 there was a terrible accident involving a small child. It was a hit and run that was never solved. Onlookers said the child ran after a pet dog that had been following the family on their walk. The child never saw the oncoming Minivan."
"So someone did die in the street outside the restaurant."
"He died in the parking lot, his mother carried him here."
I paled, "how awful. But, he...?"
"It was a six year old boy." Brenda turned away, her profile cracking, her voice less steady. "Now, if you'll excuse me."
I let her pass without another word. Something had been off about the whole thing. The shadow, the handprints and my dream, it all pointed to a little girl causing the hauntings. Abandoning my pretext of sweeping, I went through the open door of the Play Land, dragging my broom along with me. Inside the glass-walled room, the screams and shouts of children at play echoed and bounced creating a cacophony of childish delight. Beneath the multi-colored tubes and nets, parents sat contentedly with their Smartphones, a few with their open laptops enjoying free wifi.
Who are you?
Where are you?
I stared at the handprints smudging the clear glass and the road beyond where passing cars zipped by in blurs. Someone moved with labored steps down the concrete ramp on the opposite side of the drive-through lane. The woman had streaked black and silver hair; the hand that grasped the railing was thin and claw-like. She wore a flowered house dress and a shawl pinned over her shoulders. She’d been staring at me, this woman. I tried placing her from memory, but failed. She wasn't one of the regulars, not someone I'd seen among the morning risers.
I'd remember someone with a face like hers.
Something about it had impressed me with the gravity of her mourning. She’d seemed that, in mourning over someone. Her expression had been rife with misery. I watched her move painfully down the sidewalk, nearly out of sight when I drew up closer to the glass. She’d left something there. Brightly colored ribbons cascaded from a small cross beside a handful of plastic flowers: a memorial.
I started for the side door leading out to the steps curving along the side of the restaurant for street access. The alarm blared above when I pushed the bar, emitting a rush of cold air. Behind me, it banged shut resounding like a fire alarm. The woman had disappeared. I rounded the corner of the restaurant's protruding square side and dropped down to the small memorial left behind. Immediately, I saw what I'd neglected to from the window, a fashion doll like what could be found at the nearby Dollar Tree, was tucked in the ribbons.
"Why is there a memorial out there?"
Brenda looked exasperated, struggling with the gallon bucket of freshly brewed tea.
"I told you, a kid -"
"This one was for a girl. What’re you not telling me?"
She sighed and wiped her wet hands on a spare cloth lying on the counter. The afternoon rush was over and Sandi was out in the lobby, pushing a mop across the sticky floor. "Do you really want to know?"
"Yes."
Her eyes darted around, but we were quite alone as most of the other girls' shifts had ended. "Maggie's the one who told me that some kids had been playing near the construction site when the restaurant was first being built. One of them – a girl, disappeared one evening while the concrete was settling into the foundation. Workers claimed they found a shoe trapped in the hardened material, the corporation helped hush it up. The girl was missing, but even so there had been an ongoing custody battle with the girl's father. No one really knows what happened to her."
I searched Brenda's face for a lie and saw none. "The girl's mother believes she's still here....doesn't she?"
Brenda sighed. "People believe what they want to believe, Noelle. That's all I know, or care to know about the story." She bent and pushed the cart carrying the emptied bucket to the back past the fryers. I persisted, following her. "But, you have seen her, right? You have seen the ghost that haunts this place?"
"Noelle."
I stopped beside the stainless utilitarian sink in the kitchen.
"The time for scares is gone. What're you trying to do, resurrect the past?"
I felt my eyes prickle with her sharp tone.
"That's all they are, are old memories." She shook her head and walked off. "Who knows?" My boss said dismissively. "I don't believe in ghosts and neither should you."
"You can't...bury this." I mumbled, staring down at my greasy shoes. "Something needs to be done. These spirits...they're restless. They need to be appeased!"
"What? Like an exorcism?" She laughed shortly. "Get back to work, Noelle!"
That day and the ones that followed, I repeated Brenda's words and tried to make myself believe them. I could only think that she'd had a word with the store manager about my schedule as the following week, I received a deep cut in hours. "One day?" I muttered in disbelief, studying the schedule Tanya had produced for me late evening of its posting. She picked at her manicure and shrugged, "enjoy your time off, kiddo."
I wish I could.
As I was leaving, someone moved ahead of me, furtively keeping their head down. "Hey—hey, wait!" I hurried after the figure I only then recognized as the woman from the memorial. "Hey, I want to talk to you!" I ran after her and grabbed her arm. The woman tottered on her feet, uttering a helpless little cry. The full light of the streetlamp above shone on her face, pooling into her dark eyes.
"Who—"
"It's about your daughter," I said, putting on my best customer-first voice. "She’s the one who went missing…why do you think she's here?"
The woman watched me suspiciously, her hands fluttering nervously to the ragged ends of her shawl. "She comes to me in dreams. People say she's gone but I know better." Her voice was a horrible rasping croak like that of the very-aged. When she smiled it was a terrible grinning visage. "She is here, she is there," she pointed to the glowing lights of the restaurant spilling out into the dark night. "She cannot be contained."
"What do you mean?" I managed to keep my voice from trembling. My throat felt thick, my body cold in the faux leather motorcycle jacket I'd worn over a T-shirt and jeans. "I've dreamed her too! What does she want? Discovery? Her body removed from the concrete beneath?!"
She shook her head and her smile slipped. "Even a mother doesn't know all the secrets her child's heart contains."
I let her go, watching her stumble off alone, muttering to herself in low whispers.
"What does she want...?”
I walked back to my car, hands stuffed into the pockets of my jeans. Glad for the moment when the bright lights of the burger joint faded to a pinpoint distance. Something had to happen, I thought. There had to be a reason behind the spike in activity. Perhaps the season, maybe a change in the temperatures as we descended toward the coolness of fall?
On a hunch, I hopped online and searched missing persons again. One of the reports I'd overlooked matched the age and time frame of the franchise's construction. "Matilda...Swanson. Matilda...," I stared into the face of a happy, smiling five year old. The caption beside the picture said it had been taken a month before her disappearance. My heart ached thinking of the woman's broken sorrow and the shoe that had been found at the construction site.
"No one knows what you want, do they, Matilda?" I looked once more into the face of the child who had been faceless in my dreams and gently snapped the laptop shut. Sometime during the night, I dimly heard the sound of sirens and in the morning, a low haze of smoke
hung over the town.
Mom knocked on my door when I was getting dressed.
"What is it?" I called, hopping on one foot.
Mom's voice was muffled, but I still heard every word. "Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry about your job, but the burger place caught fire last night. They said on the news that the fire started somewhere beneath the building and spread upward into the kitchen.
What? I froze, one leg still stuck in the jeans, the other out firmly planted on the cold wooden floor.
"There were a few minor injuries," mom continued, oblivious to my dawning horror. "Some of the workers were taken by ambulance to Valley State Hospital."
***
An hour later, I drove past the restaurant. Yellow tape stretched across the threshold, a few blackened marks charred the roofline on the sides and puddles of ashen water lay scattered across the parking lot reflecting the dull leaden sky. Giselle called me while I cruised the hospital parking lot. She'd gotten the details from Tanya who I'd seen the night before. Apparently, she'd gone walking across the street to the 24-hour convenience store for a bag of chips and other goodies. Brenda had come in after I'd left, staying in charge to supervise the PlayLand cleaning. Tanya hadn't known what had gone on exactly. She knew she'd heard a scream echoing across the deserted street, she'd seen the lights wink out of existence plunging the restaurant into darkness and by the time she'd run back across, smoke had been pouring inside the lobby.
"Has Brenda said anything yet?"
"Not much, only that she had a report to file with Lupe. What do you think happened, Noelle?"
I leaned against the car window, staring out over the fenced expanse of the hospital grounds where the parking lot overlooked a grassy, shaded area. A few kids in drab pajamas frolicked while nurses in white looked on. "Children are fickle," I said, "even some adults are. They don't know what they want or even how heartless their actions can be. Maybe that little girl didn't want to be forgotten. Maybe her death was an accident and she couldn't move on from this plain of existence. Whatever it was, let's hope it’s over now and she can finally rest in peace."
I found another job soon after. The franchise owners sold up their holdings, allowing the county to demolish the ruins. A year later and another building was erected on the old foundation. From time to time, I still see my former coworkers, whether now in new jobs of their own or still coming and going from that new fast food joint on a busy street. I’m left wondering if it is truly over or do they still see handprints on the glass and see dark shapes running to hide at night?
-finis
AN: This story blends fiction with real events. Some of the experiences contained in this story happened to real people who I came to know last year. Thanks for reading :)
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