Serial blogging, stories to tell. Short stories and micro-fiction!

Sunday, February 20, 2011

Alone in the well? part one

By:  Jesse Edwardson

This story is dedicated to my aunt Mary Day, better known as Mickey, because she is AWESOME!!!

The old boards seemed to disappear from beneath Richie’s feet.  What they really did was fall into an old well, leading the way down for the small boy.  The largest piece hit the cold water first, followed by a shower of the smaller bits.  Richie plunged into the water last.  He fell so fast, he hardly had time to gasp.

Completely submerged, the water filled his ears with gurgling silence.  The water was ice cold.  Panic took hold of him.  He began kicking his feet and flailing his arms searching for a handhold or something to stand on.  All he found was slimy stone walls and floating  bits of wood.  Richie managed to pull his way to the surface.  He was a decent swimmer for a ten year old.  He could doggy-paddle with the best of them.  He grabbed hold of a board and coughed out a mouthful of water.  The well water tasted awful.  If green had a flavor, then this water tasted green.

“HELP!!!” cough, cough.  “HELP!!!” he cried.

It was useless to yell.  He was the only one out here in Grandpa’s woods.  The other kids were still playing in the barn.  They were all playing hide and seek.  Ritchie left the barn to hide because he was tired of always being found first.  He wandered out toward the woods and planned to hide behind a tree when he fell through the old boards that covered the old well.

“HEEEEELP MEEEEE!!!!” he screamed at the top of his lungs.  His voice bounced off the stone walls of the well and only succeeded in hurting his ears.  He yelled for help over and over again but the barn was too far away and there was no way the other kids would hear him.

He was winding up for another scream when he felt something in the water bump against his foot.

“AAHHHHH!”  he yelped in surprise.  “What was THAT!?”  He started kicking his feet and looking over his shoulders trying, in vain, to see what was below the dark surface of the water.  It felt as if something reached up from the bottom of the well and tried to untie his shoes.

“HEEEELLLLLP MMEEEEEEE!!!!  GET ME OUT OF HEERRRE!!!”   he cried again over and over.  When he finally stopped screaming, the silence fell heavily into his ears.  The well became as quiet as a well kept secret.

Again he felt a tug on his shoelace.  He pulled his foot back and tried to swim away.  Given the limited space he couldn’t go far.  Whatever was in the water followed him and tugged again at his shoelace, this time on the other foot.  He kicked both of his feet frantically under the water and started to cry.  Hot tears streamed down his cheeks as he shouted again for help.

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