Occam's Mirror

Because sometimes the most obvious answer is a distorted reflection of truth.

Tuesday 8 December 2009

The Wire Girl

The Wire Girl

"They reckon the wire girl had been there for a coupla weeks before Jackie Parks’ boy found her. Clean two foot off the ground and wrapped up in barbed wire, still as a statue ‘cept for the air in her lungs. Mike, that’s Jackie’s boy, screamed the place down, yelling bout some ghost in the woods up by the old Kerliggy folly. Course, a few people got in their jeeps and chugged up there, just to see if the boy was crying wolf, or if he’d set eyes on some poor woman done in up there. Small town people’re easy to understand, always up for something to do. Show a little town a mystery and it just jumps its way in feet first. So a few people got to see the wire girl, and then a few more, and then the local constabulary was called and that’s where it all got a bit unstuck.

See, she never moved, never called out. Never even closed her eyes. Just hung there, head back and staring at the sky. Breathin’. Folks could get close enough to see where the wire’d cut her. All filled with fresh blood, but none of it running. But no one could touch her. Just couldn’t do it. Some of 'em tried; was like watching a spastic tryin to open a pickle jar. Now, some of the good Christian folk of the town decided she was a miracle, some kind of vision from God. Others reckoned on a warning, telling us to mend our ways. I don’t really hold to that. But that folly up there in the old Kerliggy house grounds got a good load of traffic through it over the spring. Course, after that interest died down. Mike Parks took off to the city and then there was that business with the travellers over the summer months. There’s always something new to do in a small town. A few people probably still go up and see her, but most round here just let her be.
Still, she’s good for business."

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