Inspiration

Here is the story that this old street car tracks inspired. Warning the subject matter gets heavy. Even when I start out to write a fluff piece, my writing turns dark. I guess that is my voice.

Freedom

by Rita L. Smith

The streetcar clanged. Laughter pealed from inside the car. I looked up to see numerous women in various poses hanging out the windows.

Flappers, that’s what respectable people called those loose women. Personally, I envied them their freedom. They seemed much happier than me.

I married when I was thirteen. Had four kids by the time I was seventeen and widowed last year at the ripe old age of twenty. Now, I spend all of my time working and taking care of my children, trying to give them the childhood I never had.

“Carrie Ann,” one of the flappers called my name.

I glanced up to see my childhood friend, Jackie, waving at me. Her bobbed hair sported a headband with a feather in the front over the top of her forehead. It matched the bright blue beaded dress she wore.

“Hi, Jackie,” I shouted as the streetcar moved away from me.

“Come visit me tonight,” Jackie said before her voice got lost in the wind.

***

Much to my surprise, I found myself knocking on Jackie’s door later that night. I felt rather dowdy, when Jackie answered the door in yet another brightly beaded dress with a matching headband.

As Jackie welcomed me into her home, it was the same home she’d grown up in, that my parents still lived next door to, laughter rang out from a room near the back of the house.

“I didn’t know you’d have company,” I said disappointed that I wasn’t the only person Jackie had invited.

“Oh, it’s just a few friends, who dropped over unexpectedly.”

“I can come back another time.”

“Nonsense girl. I have been meaning to call you forever. Come on back and I’ll introduce you to my friends.”

The girls, all flappers, were sitting around a round table with a Ouija board on it. One of the girls asked it if she were going to marry well. The little triangle moved to the word no. They all giggled.

“Girls, this is my friend, Carrie Ann. Carrie Ann, these are my friends. Bridget in the red, Allison in the yellow and Tina in the black.”

We all exchanged pleasantries and I was drawn into their game. When it was my turn to ask the spirits a question, I balked. I couldn’t think of anything to ask. I mean it’s not like I didn’t already know I was fated to raise my children.

The planchette, which I discovered the triangle was called, began to move on the board. The girls all jumped back. Even without them touching the thing it continued to move. It spelled out C-A-R-R-I-E-A-N-N. By the time it got to the second R, I was freaked out. I mean who would want to contact me from the spirit world. Certainly not my dead husband, though I wouldn’t have put it past him.

The Ouija board continued to spell out something. Jackie grabbed a paper and pencil. She wrote down the letters as they appeared. I had a bad feeling about this, especially when the next letter was M.

I couldn’t think. My breathing was shallow and my heart felt as if it were going to pop out of my chest. I needed some air, before I passed out. I was just about to make my exit when the thing stopped.

Jackie held up the paper on which she’d been writing.

Carrie Ann marry me. The room exploded in laughter.

“Well, Carrie Ann, some spirit wants to marry you. How funny is that?” asked Tina.

I tried to join in their laughter. One of the girls wanted to know the trick. Jackie maintained that she had not rigged the board.

“It’s time to go to the speakeasy,” Bridget said. “Are you coming, Jackie dear?”

“Not this time. I want to spend some time with Carrie Ann. It’s been ages since we’ve talked.”

The brightly colored girls departed, leaving me alone with Jackie. As soon as the door was closed behind them, Jackie said, “Carrie Ann, what did you do?”

“W-w-hat do you mean?”

“You know as well as I do that that Ouija Board said, ‘Carrie Ann murder me!’ It was just lucky that the girls weren’t paying that much attention to the letters and that the spirit didn’t use correct grammar.”

How could I tell her that I had murdered my husband? It had been the last straw when I caught him with my sweet little Mary. It was bad enough that he berated me and beat me, but having sex with my baby. Well, that had been the last straw.

So, I put poison in his moonshine. The authorities thought he’d drunk himself to death and I had let them think that, but how was I to tell Jackie my darkest secret?

“Carrie Ann, I know your husband was a good for nothing wife beater. I wouldn’t blame you in the least for getting rid of him, but there’s more to the story. There has to be.”

So, with dry eyes I told Jackie why I had killed Mitchell. When I was done I broke down crying. Jackie held me until I was all cried out. “I promise you that your secret is safe with me.”

Though I never became a flapper, Jackie and I became good friends and I felt a sense of freedom that I had never felt before.