New House Memory

Flash Fiction

New House Memory

I love autumn. I love the leaves turning colors, I love the last of the flower gardens blooming, and of course no screeching hot days. What I dislike were the leaves covering my brand-new yard needing to be raked up. (We'd just moved here last spring.) Wouldn’t it be nicer if the leaves just turned colors, and then went back to green next spring?

Well, nobody wanted my opinion when trees were invented. So, I was outside, trying to rake up all the leaves. Hard to do and drink coffee at the same time...

Looking at Jean’s house, next door (with her yard all raked…) I noticed she already had Halloween stuff up! It was barely October! There was a huge pumpkin on her front step and behind it, what I gather was supposed to be a ghost! Apparently, the wind last night had messed it up a bit. Jean probably didn’t notice before she left for work.

So, working on my friendly neighbor plan, I went over to fix it. I pulled the sheet material off what I assumed to be the ghost’s head, planning to put it back together. But as soon as I touched the “head,” it spoke! “Get your dirty hands off me!”

I jumped a mile! The face was just two eyes, but the voice was loud and actually kind of scary! How did Jean do this? I loved it!!!
When Jean got home from work, I went right over to ask!

She had no idea what I was taking about. We even tried pulling it, no voice at all!

The next Saturday, she finally gave in, and told me she’d been trying to scare me! And she laughed the whole time!

We’ve been best friends now for forty-two years. Isn’t life fun!