Stories with Friends

The Lost Town

Prompt: A person is alone in a corn field maze in the middle of the night. He or she is unaware that it is prone to strange supernatural happenings. What happens? And is he or she successful in getting out?
1920s, Small Town America.

~"Now Addy, what have I told you?"
"I know mum, I know. 'Don't go into the corn field,'"
"That's my girl. Now off to bed." ~
This is what my mother would always say to me before bed on dark, rainy nights in my town. But I noticed that she didn't say it on plain old dark, rainy nights; she would tell me to avoid the corn field on dark rainy nights when I had seen no one in town for days, or when the stray cats wandering outside looked completely dry as the skies sobbed inky black rains. I never really questioned her peculiar rule, because I never thought much about it, until now. Last week, and don't tell, I snatched a newspaper off the paper cart that was owned by a man in a checkered hat, but he wasn't by his cart when I took it. I stole it and ran as fast as I could to the back of an old grocery store and read the paper.
No one looked at me questionably.
This was another strange rule my mum came up with: don't read July's paper. I don't know why she didn't want me to read July's paper. I could read June's paper, but not July. How was I going to know about the events happening in July?
"You will go to the events," she would tell me. But this time, this time I took a July paper and I was going to read it.
The front page looked fine; it had a headline of the July celebrations and a picture of the preparations. I flipped to the next page; it was fine.
The next page.
The next page.
The next pa-
...Something was off.
On the fourth page of the newspaper, cleverly concealed by the chalky pages around it, was a very, very brief story about
The cornfield.
~More strange events have taken place in the cornfield this month. No one has actually seen these obscure occurrences in full face, but they have caught brief glimpses of them in the corners of their eyes. All reports are, unnaturally, alike. They say they saw a bright green glow and heard voices and light tapping. More news will be reported next week, if there is any.
-written by C.P. ~
This is when my curiosity peaked.
Why has no one ~actually seen~ what goes on in the cornfield and why does no one question it?
I began walking down the road, going back to the cart owned by that man in his checkered hat. He was back by his cart and he didn't even look twice at me. Maybe he doesn't remember his customers, and maybe he was actually wearing a striped hat.
I walked behind a large group of people; I was right behind them and was really close, listening to what they were talking about. It was not about the cornfield to my dismay.
I walked to another group; they didn't have anything interesting to say either.
I was running from group to group. They were talking about the paper, yes, but they weren't talking about a strange occurrence. Did I have an odd sense of gossip? Are strange happenings not what people talk about?
I kept frantically scurrying around with my only July newspaper crumpling in my hands. People were beginning to look at me oddly. One woman, dressed in a Victorian style dress, turned around, as I was behind her, and looked down at me,
"What are you doing child?" She asked me. I froze,
"I was just wondering if you knew about the cornfield." I said almost too quickly. The woman gave me an odd look.
"Cornfield? What cornfield?"
A thrust of some realization hit me.
I started slowing down, slowing down and one thing was slinking through my brain. I had to go to the cornfield.
The forbidden cornfield
---
I had made up my mind for a plan as I was sitting on my bed, with my July paper neatly folded underneath my mattress.
My mother opened my door,
"Good night Addy, and remember: Don-"
"Don't go in the cornfield. I know," I cut her off frantically, too frantically. I tried my best to look into her eyes as I twiddled my thumbs.
She nodded, then went onto saying,
"Good girl," and walked out of my room. I felt terrible.
I waited until midnight to make my strange escape. I passed the time by quietly tiptoeing through the house looking for lost things. I happened to find a recent map of my town and the towns surrounding under the coffee table, as though it had fallen when no one was looking.
I looked at the map and did find a cornfield. This had to be the one my mother always warned me about because it was the only cornfield, and it was in plain sight. Why had I never seen it before?
Among the other lost things I found was a burlap bag. I folded up my map and newspaper in the bag and edged near the door.
The clock was ticking. Ticking.
Right on cue, the grandfather clock down the hall chimed it's twelve hours. I was out the door by the third chime and you didn't even hear my thick shoes squeak.
I was running down the empty streets to what I thought would be a cornfield. I was running so fast, the wind nearly whipped the hair off my head. I didn't need to be running, but something made me.
My legs quickly stopped moving; that same strange feeling made me stop in my tracks. I actually was glued to the dusty path. And there it was: a cornfield.