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Rated: E · Image · Photograph · Death · #1410056
Think Stephen King's Christine left to rust and almost die...
The old car sits at the top of Hall Hill in Robin's Field alone and abandoned. It is forgotten for months at a time by man, except when some errant boy or local hunter stumbles upon it with extra bullets or shells and time to simulate death and destruction.

I first discovered it before I knew what a Chevrolet was, before I could contemplate an era known as the 50's. My daddy and I had walked over Tumbledown Mountain one Saturday in my eleventh summer. After four miles of rocks, bushes, and brambles, we came upon a twisted, mostly grown over logging road from an era where tall timber regularly fell to the woodman's ax and chain saw, on the way to building Maine's paper mill dynasty.

"Daddy, what is that over there behind the bushes and tall grass? Can I go see?"

"That is Crazy John's Fleetline."

"What is a fleetline?"

"It is a big old car, from back when they built them to last."

"Can I go look at it?" I asked, already edging closer, through the bushes and weeds.

"Well, I guess, but he killed himself in it, back in the late 50's."

"Eeewww..." I looked around quickly and fearfully, thankful for the light and daddy's presence. You never know when ghosts and haunts are going to be around. The hairs on my neck stood up, but my curiosity won the battle.

I pushed aside blackberry bushes, and skirted a few poplar trees, to behold the hulking old car. Sun glinted and played along dented chrome and a myriad of broken glass in open window spaces and windshield.

"Don't get too close...could be haunted..."

I laughed a bit, and tried to lean further into the broken front driver's side window, imagining I saw rust colored blood stains on the side of the cracked and torn wide front seat.

"Be careful before you cut yourself."

"Damn! Ouch..."

"What did you just say?"

I cradled my left hand with right. I was already dripping fresh blood on my t-shirt. I had pierced my palm on the jagged rust flecked remnant's of a side mirror mount.

The drops had landed on the dull door paint, causing the oxidation to creep away, and be replaced with a shining black obsidian surface, deep and magnificent.

The wide door creaked open, moaning and protesting, a tomb sealed for hundreds of years, now hungry for the tasty new soul presented to it. Suddenly the interior of the car was all fresh vinyl and soothing big band sounds a soft voice said, "would you like a ride?" Suddenly my hand no longer ached from the cut. I knew that everything about this car was a mystery that begged exploration.

"What the hell are you doing?" My dad's voice was loud, high, and streaked as he grabbed my arm, yanking me away from the car and clear of the creepers and vines that had began to entangle my feet. I closed my eyes, and remember little else from the day, except waking up against cool white sheets.

My left hand, mantled in gauze and bandage burned from the cut, and I could see my daddy, sitting in a bedside chair, reading from the Bible, slowly moving his lips as he sounded out the words.

The old car sits at the top of Hall Hill in Robin's Field alone and abandon. It is forgotten for months at a time by man, except when some errant boy or local hunter stumbles upon it with extra bullets or shells and time to simulate death and destruction. Pray they do not get too curious or too close.
Think Stephen King's Christine left to rust and almost die...
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