Sometimes you had to look twice at a thing.
Eight-year-old Elijah Starret plopped back down with a humph against the back seat of his family’s vehicle as it slithered and dipped along the Blue Ridge Parkway. His parents had made a big fuss about the mountains to their skeptical son, who suspected correctly it was an effort to pacify him for having to spend the first few days of summer on a long road trip to see relatives in North Carolina.
It had been a difficult school year. Elijah’s mind frequently wandered and on multiple occasions the sound of his name being called had jolted him back from whatever world to which he’d escaped. A question would be asked of him, and he’d freeze and feel many pairs of eyes upon him and hear the snickering of classrooms. He cringed at how he must look--nervous, immature, scared--but the truth was if they could look inside they’d see he had some ideas, things he wanted to say, but never quite could. And so, his classmates saw what they saw, as did his teachers and his parents too, for that matter. The end of the year had come not a day too soon, but this was not the way he had envisioned beginning his summer.
"It's beautiful, honey," his mother had insisted. She explained that the blue in the mountains which they would be seeing, and which was sure to enthrall him, resulted from the sun reflecting off the trees, but when they had at last entered the mountains the sun had gone and there was only darkness. This was what had induced his "humph" at present, but something had now caught the corner of his eye.
Something blue.
He thought of Spirit Cowboy, a noble wrangler of comic book lore who'd been gunned down by marauding horse thieves, but whose strident soul burned too fiercely with revenge to be contained in the underworld. And so, Spirit Cowboy (originally possessing as a human the considerably less formidable name Cowboy Chuck) was returned to the ranches and prairies and back country of the Old West, having traded in his 6-shooter for a ghostly, blue-fire lasso from which marauders had little hope of escape.
And Elijah was sure he’d just seen it, out of the corner of his eye, quick as lightning. Off on the mountain side of the snaking vehicle, snapping through the tall grass like sideways lightning before drawing back and evaporating into the blackness of night. He pressed his face against the window, his nose flattening against the glass, but before he could make out anything in the twisting darkness his breath had fogged the window and by then it was too late. The car sped on.
“What are you looking at, son?” His father peered up at him in the rearview mirror.
“I saw something,” Elijah said. “In the grass.”
“Oh? An animal?”
Elijah pawed frantically at the fogged window. “No. It was blue…fiery.” He turned from the window and winced upon seeing the disappointed look in his father’s eyes in the mirror.
“Blue and fiery, huh?”
Elijah was silent.
“Well, maybe he did,” his mother said. His father cast her a stern glance.
“What did you think it was?” he asked his son. “One of your superheroes or something?”
“James…”
“I just think he needs to grow up a little,” Elijah’s father said. “Maybe that imagination of his is why he has trouble at school.”
Elijah sat back in his seat and crossed his arms. His father loved him, but among the injustices every child at some time suffers at the hands of his parents, lack of faith can sting most bitterly. The car was quiet for a good while.
***
“Like to get there by nine,” his father said.
They pulled into the driveway of his aunt and uncle’s house at 8:47pm by Elijah’s watch, tires crunching the gravel beneath and unearthing small plumes of dust which alighted briefly in the high beams before frittering away along with any remaining hopes the boy harbored that they had arrived someplace cool. He sat dejectedly as parents exited the vehicle, until his father opened the door and motioned him.
“Up and at ‘em,” he said. Elijah groaned and slipped listlessly from the car.
“Come on,” his mother said. “Everyone is looking forward to seeing you. Lucas and Kayla are close to your age. It’ll be fun.”
His father returned from the back of the car where he had retrieved their bags. Elijah trudged behind his parents, pulling his small suitcase as they crunched their way toward the front door. His father set his own suitcase down and knocked on the door. Voices and footsteps were heard and soon the door was swinging open, and Elijah groaned again because he knew there was about to occur a loathsome flurry of hugging and kissing and pinching of cheeks. He turned around and cast one last look back at the mountains from which they’d descended only minutes ago. He could not see them for the darkness, yet knew they were there, towering imprints of darkness within darkness. He remembered the episode when Spirit Cowboy had first confronted the bad guys, who fearfully stammered that they thought he was dead.
“Things are not always what they seem,” Spirit Cowboy had said.
Elijah managed a smile at this, and he squinted through the blackness for any last flickers of blue. But before his eyes could adjust there was a hand on his shoulder, pulling him into the loud and bustling house, where hugging and kissing and pinching of cheeks was certain to befall him.
***
Having endured the insufferable gauntlet of affection, which had set upon him with pinchy fingers, slobbering lips and an aroma of cheap perfume and mothballs, Elijah extracted himself and staggered toward the back of the house where Lucas and Kayla were motioning to him desperately.
“Come on,” they said, each grabbing a wrist and pulling him through a short hallway, then the kitchen--which smelled of fried things--and they escaped out the back door and stumbled into the darkness. The door closed behind them and they were clear of the house, but the night was black and Elijah paused to gain his bearings. After a moment things began to settle: the voices from the house while still audible seemed suddenly far away, a faint breeze as opposed to a relative was caressing his cheek, and the scent of perfume, mothballs and fried things gradually abandoned his nostrils and was replaced by sweet-smelling mountain air. His cousins had left him where he stood and were bounding about the yard as though they had donned night-vision goggles. Well, the boy reasoned, it was their yard after all, and they had probably spent more moments tramping through it than they had inside the house.
“May be too late!” Lucas called, flitting about the yard like an excited pup.
“Found one!” came Kayla’s voice from a more distant point in the yard.
Elijah headed in the direction of her voice. Lucas beat him there, and was crouched down adjacent his sister when Elijah reached them. The grass along the edge of the fence was a bit longer than in the rest of the yard--it tickled Elijah’s ankles as he bent forward to glimpse the source of the commotion.
“No fair!” Lucas protested to his sister. “You always see ‘em first.”
Kayla held something in her hand. Elijah could see nothing at first, like trying to detect the mountains in the darkness. But like with the mountains he knew something was there, in her hand, could tell by her rapt attention and posturing and now at last he saw something---indefinable as of yet, but something in her hand had moved, eliciting a squeal from the girl and compelling her to place her other hand protectively over the first. Elijah still could not make a positive identification and in the darkness the small, shifting shape created a scene that might have been from one of his beloved sci-fi flicks, as though some living thing was rippling beneath the skin of his cousin’s palm.
But then, blue.
Elijah started, and Lucas started because he did, but it hadn’t been due to any fear regarding the item in question. It was on account of the blue--the blue of the mesmerizing, glowing thing which was scuttling across Kayla’s palm like a diamond come alive. It was the same blue Elijah had seen not an hour before, in that lighting strike of a moment back up in the mountains, albeit much, much smaller.
“These ‘uns stay lit up for a good little while,” Kayla said, maneuvering her hands to gently restrain her prized catch. “Bet you’ve never seen any back where you’re from, huh?”
And now he knew--from what she'd just inquired of him, and from the manner in which she was moving her hands. A firefly. But, blue?
"No," he said.
"Didn't think so," she said, with a hint of a satisfaction. Elijah couldn't blame her--it was pretty darn cool.
"Got one!” Lucas. He scooted to them on his knees, cupping his prize in his upturned palms. Elijah looked behind his cousin and in the unkempt grass of the fence line tiny glimmers of blue began to materialize, as though someone had spilled a jar of glow-in-the-dark glitter. He started to edge toward the fence then paused and regarded his cousins hesitantly.
"Can I?" he asked, as though seeking permission to pet their dog.
"Better get 'em while you can." A deep voice resonated from near the house. Elijah turned. Someone had opened the back door and in the finger of light which had cut into the darkness of the lawn his Uncle Sandy was strolling toward them. "The Blue Ghosts," he said.
"'Lija ain't never seen no blue ones," Kayla informed her father. She opened her hands and watched with wonder as the minuscule cobalt creature alighted into the darkness like pixie dust.
"With good reason," said Uncle Sandy. "They're unique to us here in this part of the state. And they're only here a few weeks each summer." He patted his nephew on the shoulder. "You came at the right time."
Elijah smiled and crept over to the fence line. Kneeling down he watched for the next and nearest shimmer of blue. He didn't have to wait long. Several blades of grass suddenly sported blue embers--Elijah scampered toward them so they wouldn't disappear from sight, but he soon realized his haste was unwarranted. The Blue Ghosts remained aglow--some for what seemed at least twenty seconds or so--and Elijah realized there was more than just color which distinguished these from the fireflies he was used to back home. One would occasionally flutter away but unlike those at home these seemed to range no more than maybe a foot above the grass bed. Elijah slowly ran a hand up the base of grass blade before gently closing his fist when he'd reached the top. He stood up and smiled at the barely perceptible tickling in his palm. He cupped a second hand over the first; small shafts of blue escaped through the scant spaces between his fingers.
"How do you know if it's a boy or girl?" Kayla asked. Her father chuckled.
"Knew one of ya'll would ask that," he said. "You can be almost certain these are males. Very rare to find a female. They keep pretty much to themselves, stay in dark, shadowy places."
"What makes 'em light up, Pa?" Lucas asked, his eyes remaining fixed on his own palms. "Is it really fire? They don't burn none to touch."
"No, not fire," Uncle Sandy said. "It's called bioluminescence. And the stuff which makes that is called luciferin, actually."
Kayla looked up at her father. "Luciferin? Like the devil?"
Uncle Sandy smiled. "In a way, yes," he said. Elijah’s eyes widened and he looked up at his uncle. Every so often the yard grew dark but then the tiny creatures would flare again, illuminating the human faces in modest blue spotlights. "The name does root back to that," Uncle Sandy continued. "Means, bringer of light. Luciferin. But it's a cold light. That's why it doesn't burn."
"Cold light? Dang!" Lucas had apparently lost his ghost into the night. He knelt down near the fence line and renewed his hunt.
"Watch that tongue, boy," admonished his father. "And yes, cold light. But I don't think we're complaining, huh? Light is light, and I seen precious little as beautiful as theirs."
The children pressed on in their hunt for a few more minutes but it was late now, and the Blue Ghosts began to fade out.
"Alright, guys," Uncle Sandy said. "Bring it on in. Gotta get some sleep. Lots to do tomorrow, plus your Aunt Ella is coming in." He turned and headed back toward the house. If he heard his children groan, he did not let on.
"Oh no," Lucas said, when his father had disappeared inside. "Not Aunt Ella."
Elijah furrowed his brow. "Aunt..."
"Aunt Ella," Kayla said. "Maybe you ain't never met her. She don't usually come. She lives in Transylvania. She's a witch, we think."
Elijah looked at the darkened silhouettes of his cousins. They weren't above pranking him but there was a gravity in their tone which unnerved him. He exhaled deeply when his Uncle Sandy opened the back door again, spilling a swath of light into the yard where the children stood.
"Time for bed," his uncle called.
***
"Apples," Aunt Mildred said, as dinner wound down the next evening. "She sells apples to the local markets. She'll probably bring some when she comes."
Uncle Sandy checked his watch. "IF she comes. Thought she was going to be here this morning."
"Ella has always followed the beat of a different drummer," Aunt Mildred said. "Be nice."
Kayla leaned toward Elijah. “Those apples are ghastly,” she said. “All shriveled up like little shrunken heads.”
“Stop it, Kay,” Aunt Mildred admonished. “She freezes them, is all, to preserve them. They are perfectly fine for cooking.” Kayla made a gaggling gesture toward Elijah, who tried not to laugh. Dessert was served--peaches with ice cream--but there was still no sign of Aunt Ella by the time the last plates had been cleared. The sun faded and Elijah looked at his cousins, hoping for an encore with the Blue Ghosts, but before they could make a move, Uncle Sandy summoned everyone to the living room and dimmed the lights.
“Home movies,” he said, pointing a remote at the television. “We all rarely get to see ‘un another, so I figured this is good as way as any to catch everyone up.” The children in the room eyed one another with horror. Home movies? When the last Blue Ghosts of the season beckoned outside? But before they could conjure any desperate act of protest, they were swept up in the crush of adult bodies which were surging towards furniture and Elijah grunted as he was forcefully plopped down onto the couch and sandwiched between his mother and Aunt Mildred. The children glanced at one another from behind jostling walls of flesh belonging to various amply proportioned relatives. Elijah felt like one of Aunt Ella’s shriveled apples. There was no escape. The house fell dark save for the TV screen and the whites of the eyes of frightened children. Uncle Sandy nodded, grinning with a satisfaction peculiar to those who have utterly misjudged the will of the people.
“You’re going to love this, kids,” Uncle Sandy informed them. He pointed the remote at the TV. Family Vacation, read the large, ghost white letters expanding onto the screen. There came a sudden rapping from the front door. Uncle Sandy muttered and paused the TV.
“Dang,” he said.
Thank you, Elijah thought. He looked at his cousins and thought he detected similar traces of hope.
"Gotta be Ella," Uncle Sandy said.
Elijah felt the hairs prick on the back of his neck; the reprieve had been short-lived. He watched his uncle approach the front door and suddenly the wall of flesh in which he was half-buried felt considerably less oppressive. He peered out from behind fleshy appendages as the front door was pulled open but at first could see nothing for although the house was nearly dark, the night framing whoever now stood in the doorway was darker yet. But now something flickered, a brief illumination in the doorway before fading out.
“Hello, Ella,” said Uncle Sandy and they could all hear the floor creak under the feet of the person who had now stepped in from the darkness. Elijah cast a nervous glance toward his cousins, but his attention was redirected by the reappearance of the flickering he’d glimpsed moments before. Blue. And now he saw: three darting blue specks which had accompanied this late-arriving visitor into the house.
“Who let Luciferin,” Lucas snickered. “Ow!” He rubbed his elbow as his mother glared at him reproachfully.
“You kids best snatch’ em up,” came a raspy voice from the dark silhouette materializing in the living room. “They don’t last long indoors.” Elijah looked on as Lucas and Kayla exchanged hesitant looks before springing to their feet. The ghosts glimmered again, before zipping out of sight into farther recesses of the living room. Elijah heard the thumping of his cousins’ sneakers as they gave chase. A few moments later they rushed to the front door and released their catch. Uncle Sandy closed the door and switched on a small lamp.
“Expected you this morning, Ella,” he said.
“Oh, hush now.” His wife had gone into the living room to greet her sister. “Ella,” she said, and Elijah watched his aunts share a stiff hug, the stiffness deriving, apparently, from the fact Aunt Ella’s arms had scarcely moved. They hung from her body like anchors and Elijah could see why: in each shriveled hand was clutched an overstuffed sack of shriveled apples.
“For the pie,” Aunt Ella said.
Aunt Mildred bent and grabbed each of the bags. “Kayla, Lucas,” she called, and her children approached dutifully. “Take these to the kitchen.”
Elijah inched forward on the couch. Aunt Ella wore long, dark clothing, even though it was summer. She was slightly built, hunched--considerably shorter than her sister. Elijah half-expected to glimpse a wart-covered nose and crooked teeth, but when she raised her bowed head and smiled at her niece and nephew, Elijah saw a small, unblemished nose, and an intact set of unremarkable teeth. Aunt Mildred turned to those still seated in the living room.
“Come on in and say hello.”
***
“They ain’t as pretty as they once were, but still good inside,” Aunt Ella said. The kids were going to hike down to the creek for some bluegill fishing but had been told first they had to help their aunt prepare her apples for her famous pie. Lucas and Kayla had groaned but knew better than to argue--and their aunt’s pies were good. It was just that it was summer, an indisputable time of magic for a child, and there was only so much sand in the hourglass before another summer had passed.
Their aunt had placed the apples in freezer bags and thawed them overnight in a pan of water in the kitchen. She had drained the bags and now the children were peeling away skin, plucking stems, cutting away cores, and chopping the apples into pieces.
“Isn’t it easier to peel ‘em before freezin’?” Kayla asked.
“Easier, yes,” Aunt Ella acknowledged, without looking up from the dough she had rolled out onto the wooden cutting board. “But not everything easier is better. My way holds the flavor better. I don’t mess with ‘em until I’m right ready to put ‘em into the pie.” She rolled and kneaded the dough, grunting occasionally. "Damned arthritis," she said.
The children were silent, and continued to work.
"You don't say much." Elijah looked up to see Aunt Ella looking right at him. He froze, like on so many occasions in class when he felt the ridicule of twenty pairs of eyes searing into him. But when he looked back at his aunt her own eyes were soft and kind and he began to untense, as though a knot had been untied within him.
"How was your flight?" he asked. His cousins erupted in laughter.
"Flight?" Lucas said. "You think she come by broomstick?” His aunt shot him a look.
“No,” Elijah said sheepishly. “But… you said she’s from…”
Understanding lit upon Aunt Ella’s face. "Poor child," she said. "You thought--Transylvania--well, few folks outside our state know there's another.” She patted his hand. "Transylvania, North Carolina," she explained. "One county over." She regarded Kayla and Lucas reproachfully. "But it might as well be the other one, little as y'all come and see me."
“We didn't think you liked visitors," Kayla said.
"And what gave you that idea?" their aunt inquired. "Did you ever ask me?" Kayla was silent. "Sometimes you gotta find things out for yourself," Aunt Ella said. She regarded Elijah. "My trip in was fine, thank you. And yours?”
"Pretty good," Elijah said.
"Tell her 'bout Spirit Cowboy!" Lucas blurted. It was his sister, older and more heeding of lessons learned, who shot him the admonishing look this time. Aunt Ella's eyes had remained fixed on Elijah's and in them the boy became emboldened by the notion that there was more power in facing embarrassment than fleeing it.
“It’s a comic,” he said. “Spirit Cowboy. He has a magic blue lasso, and…”
“And?”
“He fights villains. We were driving through the mountain on the way here and I…I saw something blue.”
“The Blue Ghosts!” Lucas interjected, unable to restrain himself. “You saw ‘em yourself out in the yard.”
“But it wasn’t!” Elijah bolted upright in his chair, surprising everyone, including himself. “It was big, lit up a whole big area in the grass when we went by, and then it disappeared.”
Aunt Ella patted his hands. “Your not always well-mannered cousin could be right. The Blue Ghosts are known to congregate in large numbers, and they will light up in unison, then fade out as if they’d never been there. They love the tall grass; I wouldn’t be surprised you seen ‘em there.”
Elijah slumped back in his chair.
“No, no,” Aunt Ella said. “Do not be upset. The Ghosts are as little-known as Transylvania is. And shoot, I don’t know for sure. Maybe it was this cowboy fella you talk of.” She smiled, and Elijah couldn’t help but do likewise. “But if they were the ghosts,” his aunt said, “count yourself lucky. They don’t stick around long as the usual kind, and ya never know when you might see a thing again.”
They toiled silently for a spell, the only sound the slaughtering of apples.
“Them blue gill will be hiding out once that sun gets too high,” Aunt Ella finally said. “Get a move on. What’s your bait?”
“Crickets!” Lucas said, halfway out of the kitchen already. “Ain’t got no night crawlers.”
“Crickets take time to catch,” Aunt Ella said. She reached into a pocket of her garment, pulled out a hunk of bread and tossed it onto the table. “Stale,” she said. “I keep it for the birds. All the company I get sometimes. Anyways, tear off little chunks, ya know? Ball ‘em up. Them fish surely love it.”
Kayla plucked up the bread. Lucas nudged Elijah. “Come on.”
“He’ll be along in a moment,” Aunt Ella said, and Elijah watched her eyes trail his cousins out of the kitchen, before returning to his own. “What grade you in?” she asked him.
“Going into third.”
“You like school?”
Elijah bit his lip. “Not always.”
Aunt Ella shook her head. “Ain’t that a shame,” she said. “But I don’t believe any child is mean on his own. They done and learn it. You’re a good boy. Tough to be kind in an unkind world. Your ma and pa understandin’ ‘bout it?”
Elijah nodded slowly. “But they tell me I also got some growing up to do.”
Aunt Ella looked mortified. “Goodness no!” she exclaimed. “Third grade? Don’t you go doing any such thing. Be time enough for that later. Now you scoot on outta here. Thanks for the help with the apples. You’ll let me know later what you think of the pie.”
***
Aunt Ella had been right: the blue gill loved the bread. You had to ball it up firm or it would disintegrate, but they attacked it like piranha. Fish was added to the menu at dinner that night. Dessert was apple pie and, for those who desired it, a scoop of vanilla ice cream atop it. It was good, very good--Elijah even asked for seconds, which seemed to bring his aunt no small measure of satisfaction. After dinner Elijah and his cousins spoiled out the back door and back into the yard.
The ghosts were clustered again in the taller grass by the fence line, and each child delighted in catching what they could. They stayed outside a long while, until they could scarcely make each other out in the darkness, though mere inches apart. They stayed long past when the ghosts had flickered out for the evening, replaced by mosquitoes which buzzed their ears maddeningly and bit their naked ankles. They stayed until Uncle Sandy at last threw open the back door and called them in from the darkness.
***
It was to Elijah the strangest of feelings, not wanting to leave a place you hadn’t wanted to go. He felt somehow more than three days older, and as their vehicle wound its way back up the Blue Ridge Parkway, he pondered the season of things.
“Where was Aunt Ella’s family?” he asked suddenly. “Is she divorced or something?”
He watched as his parents exchanged glances.
“I’m sorry, honey,” his mother said. “I thought we’d mentioned before. Her husband and daughter died, many years ago. Charles and Jasmine. Car accident. Terrible thing. Your poor aunt. It’s why she stays mostly to herself now.”
Elijah was quiet. He squinted against the blades of sunlight segmenting the mountainside. The thought of another school year did not upset him as much as it once had, but he still wished for the summer to endure as long as possible. He was anxious to get home, where he would maybe ride his bike or catch up on the latest from Spirit Cowboy. At nightfall, he would see if the neighbor kids wanted to catch fireflies--granted, they were just ordinary yellow ones, but still. Yes, they must get home as soon as possible, before firefly season ended and another summer slipped away--before the sand in the hourglass had once again run out.