Once, there was a little old lady who spoke to the scarecrows. All the children in the town would sit on their bicycles, completely still, and watch her. Nobody remembered a time when the little old lady wasn't there. She had been there for centuries, everyone thought. In the evening, after supper, she would take any food she hadn't finished, and set it down at their feet. Some days, she'd prepare food, and wait to eat with them. No parent that gave a damn let their kids go into that field. Not even they, themselves would venture out. The little old lady was the only one to go out there in years. Every time someone asked her why she did it, she said she didn't want her little boys to get lonely. Surely she was old and couldn't remember well. That was possibly the oddest thing. Twelve years ago, her three sons went out into the field to pick berries for pie. They had done it before, so there was confidence they would return without harm. To this day, not one person knows what happened to them. Some have ghost stories that the brothers haunt the meadow, and that's why no one goes. Others, skeptics of that idea, just believe that it does people no good, going around where children died. The boys' mother, however, seems to think otherwise. On a bright, sunny winter's day, the little old lady went out into the field to dine with the scarecrows. As usual, the kids were watching her, and as a result, the adults were watching the kids. Nothing was special or unusual about that day in particular. She had walked out, and greeted the three, resolute straw men. She set down her basket, and proceeded to say grace. As she finished, one of the children biked away. Like kids do, when one left, the others followed suit. Though the children had gone, a few parents lingered in their windows, enthralled by the little old lady, but eventually, they too departed. Once the little old lady and the scarecrows were alone in the field, no one watching, the scarecrow in the center of the three, moved. It extended it's arm towards the woman, and gripped her shoulder. She stood up and took a step back, looking, not frightened, but confused. The scarecrow then stepped forward, and absorbed the little old lady.
"And that, sir," the lieutenant said, voice hardly above a whisper, "is where the report stopped. The reason for our great concern on this little old lady's disappearance, sir, is the fact that this case is extremely similar to a case form about 12 years ago. We brushed it off due to it's odd description. Three boys went missing in that same field. All from the same circumstances."
"Thank you, lieutenant. We will look into it," the general calmly stated
just as the lieutenant was about to walk out of the room, he burst out, "Oh! Sir, I forgot to mention, yesterday, my team went out to investigate the scene, but there weren't three scarecrows, sir. There were four."
>TheArgentPanda<
First Written from October 25, 2019 to November 8, 2019