Rhea County: A Short Story

The cacophonous sound of rain flooded my ears, but the wind had since died and it now pendent down in vertical parallel paths like ropes dependent on the sky to support them.

When people envision our beautiful little town, for the most part they think imagine the serene beaches, beautiful weather, and cool college town vibe. Oprah has even donned it the “happiest place on earth.” It’s doubtful, though, that either Oprah or the other visitors who come to

I’m from a small & affordable town called Eudora, Arkansas which is a city in Chicot County, with the population of about 2,900 people. I grew up on North Cherry Street in the house with my grandmother, mom, aunt, and father. We all stayed there when I was first born because my parents weren’t financially ready to live on their own. We were back & forth from both of my grandparents house for a few years.

Howardsville, a quaint little city, nestled in the foothills of the Putney Mountains located forty miles southwest of Charleston, West Virginia, has a dark history. Having lived his entire life in the two –story house on the outskirts of town, Ernest Cassidy was familiar with the myths, legends, and lies about his city and was always quick to defend it.

After walking down the path for several minutes, the trees began to become desolate and sparse, and a chill came into the air. You pulled your cardigan tighter around your frame, and reached into your jeans pocket to grab your phone to use as torch. The light seemed to have faded from the sky, big dark clouds now looming overhead.

This morning - as I descended down a mountain over-pass, there was this most beautiful sheet of

It was a usual rainy day in the small city of Hillsboro, Oregon. The drizzle fogged the

Four days passed without the ground or the scene changing much, except that behind them Weathertop slowly sank, and before them the distant mountain loomed a little nearer… At the end of the fifth day the ground began once more to rise slowly out of the wide shallow valley into which they had descended… Next day, early in the morning, they came down again to the borders of the Road… At once they went on again, hearing no sound but the water swirling against

I watched as the first orange hued rays of the sunrise wash over the dark and mysterious sky. The small glow travels across the wild blue yonder and starts to brighten up the deepest parts of the skyline and the town. Under the radiating sky there was no place of hiding, the light would finally hit you. This bright light brought the new day in, but it also brought dread to some.

The region we had been traversing had recently been suffering severe drought, however we simply had to carry on through to our destination. We pitched camp to prepare for dusk at the foot of an arch-tree among a vast forest of similar structures, soaring kilometers high and as thick as the oak trees back home were tall.

The fells stretched out in front of them, grey and indistinct through the drizzle. There’s a saying he grew up with, ‘if you can see the hills it means it’s just about to start raining. If you can’t, it already has’. He’s known that saying as long as he can remember.

With the sudden arrival of the fog the already cool autumn air seemed to chill even further down to a frost-cold as the thick cloud filled in the area, choking the visibility all around us. The abrupt plummet in temperature having brought with it a fresh set of goose bumps for me which caused me to give thought into throwing a few more pieces of wood upon the fire.

It was a seemingly calm and peaceful fall night when a soft murmur echoed throughout the damp forest. “I can’t believe I just did this,” hung in the cool air and was carried away by the light wind. A motionless body lay on the damp forest floor, blood trickling onto the ground and soaking into the soil. Loud footsteps became fainter and fainter as they left the corpse and went far away.

The cloud was blocking the sun, an old shrine that was built deep into the forest, as the fog started to grew thicker each passing minute. Moss continues to grow on the shrine gate and on the staircase that leads to the dilapidated shrine. Little rain drops began to fall on puddles creating a drop sound singling that the droplet has descend. A person whom was staring into the cloudy sky, sitting on a log that was stuck in the water as wind started to blow its way.

The rain began letting up as he neared his destination, the lights in the distance now visible, as the rain slowly pattered down. Not much longer, he thought to himself.