The Frightening Night.

I have a spooky story to tell.

It’s nearly 1:30am and I’m tired, but I have to write about what just happened.

So D.W. and I went to see a movie tonight at the Davis Theatre. The Davis is in Lincoln Square. We live in in Edgewater. It’s about three miles away. We decided to walk. The night was cool, but we have jackets and scarves and strong legs, so we hoofed it over to Leland and Lincoln. The movie, an Indian film called “The Namesake,” was good and so was the popcorn.

On the way home, D.W. remarked how full and bright the moon was. I looked up and nodded, thinking back to my waitressing days and how weird people would get when there was a full moon. Empirical evidence or not, I swear it’s true.

Just as I was recalling this, D.W.‘s hand flew out and grabbed my arm. He had stopped dead in his tracks and now I was stopped too.

“Oh my God. Look at that.”

I looked to my right and saw a white, faceless mannequin, posed in a bent-over fashion in the garden of the house we were passing. The mannequin was wearing a bonnet and was pouring water from a plastic watering can into a bird bath or gazing pool of some kind—she was clearly hooked up to a fountain somehow. She wore a quilted dress, which was fully animated by the breeze that was blowing. Several lights were aimed at her from below, casting a glaring light and a long shadow on the house behind her.

D.W. shuddered. “What the hell would possess someone to put that in their garden?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe it’s a scarecrow thing.”

We both agreed that it was spooky and continued our walk home.

Not five minutes later, at Ashland and Winona, (not far from the theatre where I happen to spend a great deal of my time), we crossed to the northeast corner of the intersection and got onto the sidewalk.

“Watch out!” D.W. suddenly yelled, and I heard the sound of water splattering onto the sidewalk very close to where I was standing.

I leapt out of the way just in time. As I was dodging the stream of what we can only hope was water, D.W. was looking up. We quickly scrambled to the side of the building and surveyed the situation. What we had here was a condemned building. “Keep Out” signs were posted in nearly every window and those without signs were broken or hanging open. The outer door to the building as well as the inner door to the stairwell were both propped wide open with a broom handle. From the street, we could see graffiti on the walls inside.

As soon as those seconds of initial confusion wore off, the anger came in. “Hey!” shouted D.W. up to the second story window. “Why don’t you come down here?”

I was happy to contribute to that idea myself, yelling, “You wanna pour water on me? Come down here! I can pour water, too!” I turned to D.W. “Did you see him?”

“I just saw his hand and the pitcher he was holding,” he said. “The arm came out; it turned the pitcher and then disappeared back inside.”

“A pitcher? But the water came down in a stream, though.” I had turned in time to see it the moment it happened. From the arc of the water, I had thought someone was spitting on us, actually.

D.W. was getting out his phone. “Well, it wasn’t a pitcher, exactly. It was like a watering can or something. I’m gonna call 311. There are squatters or crackheads up there.”

A chill ran through me. “Wait, what did you say?”

“I’m gonna call the cops.”

“No, about the person. It was a watering can?”

“Yeah, I think so.” There was a glimmer of recognition in D.W.‘s eyes. He knew what I was thinking.

“Like that mannequin.”

Our eyes got very wide. Neither one of us is interested in spooky stories or working ourselves into a frenzy over imaginary worries, but it was all so creepy. A condemned building is an ominous thing. The windows were open or broken; those spray-painted words looked frightening and desperate under the single bulb still lit in the hallway; the propped open door was proof that there was activity where there ought not to have been any. On top of that, someone was in there. At least one someone. At least one someone who felt it would be fun to pour water on passersby like us.

D.W. described the hand that poured the water emerge from the black “like something from a haunted house.”

The cops came quickly and went up into the building. We could see their flashlights going into each room in the dark. As we waited on the street, one of the second-floor windows suddenly opened and a woman’s head came out of the darkness.

“Hey, what’s goin’ on down there?” she asked. She had lived hard, this woman.

“Someone’s pouring water on people,” D.W. said.

“You mean there’s someone else here?” The woman looked drugged.

“Yeah,” I said. She went on to defend the fact that she was still there, as if we were the authorities.

“I got one more load to take outta here, but I can’t do it till tomorrow,” she said. “I’m the last one left, I thought. These gang bangers, though, you never know what they’re up to.” She retreated into her room and out of sight.

Later, as we turned the corner to the apartment, I stopped. “D.W.,” I said slowly, “It was her.”

“What?”

“It was that woman who poured the water.”

D.W.‘s eyebrows lifted. “Wow. You’re probably right.”

“Seriously,” I said. “Seven cops went up there. They didn’t find anything. But that woman was there, on the second floor. Same floor as the watering can. I think it was her.”

It had to have been that woman. Because there isn’t a mannequin on the second floor of that condemned building. We know that. We know that mannequins don’t play jokes on people at 12:30am as they walk on the streets below.

But like, define “mannequin.”

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Frenchy Bound.

I leave for France in less than a month, now.

Going to France is great. I wish I spoke French. That would increase my enjoyment of France, no doubt, though I’ve always managed to have a fine time anyway.

My mom and I will be visiting many of the same places in Provence that we have been during previous trips. For a nostalgia addict like myself, this is great. It’s a lovely thing to be a world away from your own doorstep and be surrounded by familiar sights.

I will see the bend in the road that leads up to the woods outside Aix-en-Provence. I will turn at the bend and run up the hill so that I can check up on the forest and make sure it’s behaving itself.

I will greet the elevator in the hotel in Avignon with narrowed eyes. I will say, “Hello again, ascenseur. You are slow. I will take l’escalier, instead.”

I will remember how to get back to the Soulieado Museum in Terascon.

And after I’ve remembered everything, I’ll head to Paris and recognize very little of anything. I suspect the confusion will be glorious. I also suspect I will have trouble seeing through brimmed up tears of joy when I walk through the Louvre.

My France trip will also allow me some solitude.

I hope I’ll be able to recognize that, too.
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Goby Go Home.

It was disgusting.

Slowly gelatinizing on the jetties at Montrose and Foster Beach today were dozens upon dozens of dark, slug-like fish. D.W. and I had to hop over and around them during our afternoon jog.

“What the hell?” I said, annoyed and more than a little scared. I remembered how I had accidentally stepped on a slug while running in Croatia last summer and how the slug’s guts had squirted up onto my leg. Squishing one of these ugly fish would yeild even more juice. I didn’t want any part of it.

“These fish aren’t supposed to be here,” said D.W., stopping to get a closer look.

“They most certainly are not,” I said, surveying the squirming jetty. “These fishermen need to clean up after themselves. It’s revolting.”

“No,” D.W. said, peering down at one of the mottled, big-lipped fish. “These are those Goby fish, from China. They’re not supposed to be here at all. If you catch one, you have to leave it out of the water. It’s actually illegal to throw a Goby fish back.”

I looked over at a couple of old fishermen who had at least six poles going between the two of them. They had a pile of Goby fish off to one side. I smiled, my perspective now totally changed.

“Well, good for them!” I exclaimed. “Everyone’s doing a fine job!”

“Hardly,” said D.W. “There are millions of these things out there. They’re wreaking havoc on the Lake.”

Suddenly, the dozens of writhing, gasping Gobies looked like a near-pointless attempt and I was upset again.

D.W. went on. “They compete for the habitats of the native fish and really mess with the ecosystem. They can live in total darkness and they don’t mind nasty water; Lake Michigan is perfect for the Goby, unfortunately.”

“How do you know so much about Goby fish?” I asked him, giggling a little. It was funny hearing him say “Goby.”

“You really ought to read the paper more often, Mary.”

“Why?” I said. “I like finding out about stuff like this. Wading through fish and getting the scoop from you is way more fun than just reading about it.”

We ran home, and I thought about how my knee hurt.

 

 

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Skylight, Et Al.

We’re putting in a skylight.

Actually, “we’re” not putting in anything. A professional contractor is putting a skylight in for us. It would not be wise for me to undertake such a project. I have many talents; cutting holes in roofs and then putting sheets of glass into the holes to make “windows” is not one of them.

It’s because of the condo construction nextdoor. Yesterday the bedroom window was covered up.

D.W. admitted that he called the skylight guy for an estimate just to make me feel better. Even though it was his idea, he told me he had little faith that a skylight would cost less than $1500, making it an impossibility. As it turns out, the contractor who came told us he can install our skylight for less than half that and the process is relatively painless. In three days, blessed sunlight will once again filter into the apartment, this time from the heavens. I have faith that this solution may prove to be a grand-slam. I think the apartment will look better than ever once this groovy skylight is in place.

To show my gratitude to D.W. and The Gods, I promptly reorganized the contents of the kitchen cupboards, cleaned the coffeepot, and made dinner.

There was a request for “paskettie,” so that is what I made. “Paskettie” is spaghetti, of course, but in the dialect of a younger me. My paskettie sauce was made from scratch and turned out beautifully, if I do say so myself. The pasta itself was perfect in its aldente-ness, and I served haricot vert (tossed with balsamic reduction and toasted pine nuts, thank you very much) on the side.

And the construction men had gone home by the time dinner rolled around, so what light lingered in the kitchen only faded because the sun set; that is a kind of dimming I will always accept.

Paskettie.

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