Dead Man's Curve Creative Writing

The ground rumbled and shook as the 9:30 Friday night, frightfreight train barreled down the east side tracks. The grinding snarl and rhythmic clickety-clack, clickety-clack, clickety-clack grew louder as the engine pulled its cars along the slaloming S-curve that cut across Old Route 22. The cry of the whistle began its lone, sorrowful warning as the train approached the road. Everyone in town called the crossing Dead Man’s Curve. The whistle wailed on for what seemed an eternity as the intersection was pierced by the light of the locomotive, and the rumbling cars swooshed through the chill night air.

A flurry of bats rose into the gloaming, their twilight feast briefly interrupted, before settling back to the serious task of catching and consuming a million swarming bugs plucked right out of thin air. Their sheer winged shadows made a moving lacework across the silvered quarter moon rising silently above the inky black lake. Most of the village houses rose dark and dormant around the lake. A few cast streaks of golden light across the softly rippling water from their windows. Only one lone cottage was set back against the rising foothillfoot hill on this side

of the lake. It nestled close to the double edged ribbon of track that traced itself along the ground.
***
Inside the stationmaster’s cottage, the world shook as if it would never end. The passing train rattled every window in its sash, rocked every hanging light, and even set the filigreed bird cage in the corner swaying back and forth. An indigo blue Macaw perched stolidly on his dowel, barely opening one eye and ruffling a few of his neck feathers at the interruption of his sleep.
He had lived so long in this house, that the rollingroiling and rumbling of trains coming and going bothered him no more than the barked howls and raucous, early morning cries of howler monkeys in the canopy of the rainforest had, when he was just a wee youngster.
In the corner of the room, tucked silently beneath the dozing bird, two figures pressed against the wall, waiting for the rumble of the train to recede as the last cars passed the small, neat cottage, winding their way up into the waiting hills and beyond. The world outside seemed fraught with danger and excitement to Youngest, the newest and least disciplined Dream GiverDreamGiver of the small clan that served the the, sleepingnow sleeping, villagers.
The small wisp of a being began sliding purposefully along the wall toward the opening into the small spare kitchen. “Wait ‘till it passes and then some,” whispered Patience. “Sometimes the boy gets up to watch the caboose pass by.”
Sure enough, within just a few moments, the pad of stealthy feet could be heard sneaking down the narrow stairway. Youngest, the newest of the DreamGivers, slid back again, melding perfectly into the shadowy corner with the taller, portlier translucent figure.
A boy slipped furtively past the bird that now watching him expectantly. Cocking its head jauntily to the right, it opened its beak as if to call out a greeting. The boy gave the bird a quick shake of the head, holding his finger up to his lips. “Alright, Brig, a cracker it is , I know your price for silence,” he whispered. The bird bobbed his head, gave a little clack of his beak, and settled down to watch the boy tiptoed into the kitchen. Two steps to the right, avoiding the creaking old floor boards, and the boy had reached the main cupboard. He pulled a couple of cookies and a few oyster crackers from their containers. Leaving the kitchen, he tossed the three Llittle oyster crackers, one after the other to the waiting bird, barely giving him time to eat one before tossing another hexagon of crunchy goodness. The bird blinked as the boy crept back up the steps with his ill-gotten gain.
After a few breaths, the bird shrugged his wings, settling his beak on his feathery chest. A soft, steady whistle of breath could be heard as the bird dropped back into sleep. “ ‘ts alright now. Time to gather,” Patience whispered. “Just remember, don’t press … it’s a lightness of touching we want, a skimming of just the top memories…gather what you will, but try…please try to behave yourself tonight. Only a few things tonight, we will gather more tomorrow.” Patience looked down fondly at Youngest, the small sprite of a DreamGiver.
Patience had been given this task because the council was quite certain that she was the only one with the necessaryneccesary skills to wrangle the young pup into a proper DreamGiver. They had almost given the youngling the name of Unruliest, but Kindest had been quick to point out that this might hurt the small one’s feelings, and it could crush her exuberant spirit. She did not, however, think that she herself, kindes though she might be, was the one for the job of training this particularly challenging sprite.
“I’ll try. Really. I will try my best tonight,” Youngest replied, even as her body began to twirl and her fingers began to itch with desire to touch absolutely everything she could see in the silvery moonglow. It was painful to make herself flit properly across the rug and run her curious fingertips so lightly along a small leather bound book of poetry laying on the arm of a comfortably old leather easy chair. The cover was worn with age, the corners wrinkledcrinkled and cracked from many turnings of the pages. It had once been dyed all blue with gilded lettering on the front, Bbut loving hands had worn the blue away where it had rested on them, and the gilt had lost some of its shine from their rubbing. Still, the words inside were strong and Youngest could feel memories of the poems rising up like a symphony of images and sounds in her mind…

I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a gray mist on the sea's face, and a gray dawn breaking.

I must go down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the seagullssea-gulls crying.

I must go down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way, where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover,
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

“You are pressing young one. You mustn'tmusn’t linger…” Patience’s voice slid down to someoneUnruliest from somewhere up above. The older, more experienced Dream GiverDreamGiver was still doing all of the high work in the room, touching the bits and baubles on the few higher shelves in the room.
Guiltily, YoungestYoungestt pulled her fingertips away from the beautifully well-worn book. The cadence of the poem still resounding through her mind…she hummed a few lines to herself, knowing she shouldn’t be going that deep, just a phrase or two would have done. But who could possibly resist the music and magic of those lovely lilting lines? She could imagine herself a Dream GiverDreamGiver on a ship … a big sailing ship … with decks, and lanterns, and scallywagsscalliwagss…. and … and … pirates! That was it! A DreamGiver to pirates is what she should be! Her thoughts of pirates and gypsies and rolling ocean waves in the moonlight had her twirling and leaping along the worn edge of the faded rug.
Patience’s voice held an unusual edge of exasperation as she hissed a whisper…” “Settle down now! You’ll wake the bird with all your singing and whirling about!”
Youngest realized her mistake just as she tripped on a flagstone of the hearth and plowed into a coffee cup left there by the old man.

She staggered as she tried to keep the mug from slipping over the edge and pouring the dredges left in the bottom onto the thinning weave of the rug. In her little bout of indulgence, she had forgotten to hold herself in her shadowform. Her body had thickened, grown heavier and more present than she should have allowed. So much present that the cup did, in fact, slide over the edge, clunk to the floor, and spill the last few dregs onto the floorboards.. The thunk woke the bird, which Youngest had always always, always longed to stroke and hug and become friends with. But, whenwithhich Patience, assured her was very much against the

rules.
Above, in the sparsely furnished bedroom, the old stationmaster rolled over in his bed, wondering briefly in his half sleep if he had heard something from below. When the bird, now staring rather curiously at the small bright figure of Youngest tugging at a coffee mug bigger than she was, had not set off with an alarm of calls and squawks to wake him, the old man rolled back over and let the night fill him with silence. At the foot of his bed a weathered seaman’s chest held a thousand thousand memories of rolling wave, snapping sails, and sea shantieschanties sung at full voice.
As the room below drifted into true darkness, the bird and the little Dream GiverDreamGiver locked eyes.

***

Masefield, John. “Sea Fever by John Masefield.” Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation, www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/54932/sea-fever-56d235e0d871e.