The Graves Of Nags Head Woods

With the coming of Halloween, the cooler days, the earlier nights, the darker evenings, and that crisp white moonlight that shines through the twisted branches of our forests, I get to look forward to sharing some fun and spooky stories with you. This one came to mind after a comment from one of my brothers, who asked if I was ever going to write a collection of fiction tales like my ghost stories. I remembered this story I wrote for Haunting The Carolina Coast, back when I still was calling it Ghosts of the Outer Banks.

It's kind of a true story, at least in the way some of it happened. I really did, only once, go on an adventure to Nags Head Woods with my oldest brother in his Jeep, and we did go see the tree in the story. The rest, well, some of this is a little made up, some of it was real.

I think that the most scary part of this story really is what it was like to be a ten year old. It's a tough time, and I hope I captured it well for those kids out there who went through the same stuff I did.

I'll add this little caveat; I'm an author and a storyteller. This was a first draft that I massively changed because it just was a little too harsh for my books, as well as too intimate. It has some parts that would need to be edited for clarity and grammar, but I wrote the story as if I was telling it out loud, acting it out. So just know, it's not perfect, and not meant to be.

The Graves Of Nags Head Woods

I have a picture my mom took of me, back when I was only ten years old. The Seventies were in full swing, and you could tell by the clothes I wore. It didn’t help any that I was nearsighted and wore glasses, too. So there I am, in this faded Instamatic square photo with a white frame, wearing a purple t-shirt with hibiscus flowers and these stupid checkered shorts with discount Ked’s shoes with one shoelace untied, standing there, dumb bowl haircut and brown glasses. My pants are dirty of course, because when were they not? I’m just standing there, in our driveway, not smiling, even though somehow Mom thought this whole thing was hilarious.

It wasn’t because I was dressed funny or because I came back all dirty or anything like that. It was because in the picture, even though I looked like a little ten year old nerdy kid in glasses with a bad haircut, in one hand I held this long bladed survival knife, like the Marines had during World War II. I’m just standing there, pointing it down, by my side, but I have this look on my face that says I’ve just been in two knife fights, won them, and I’m just daring anyone, any one, for a third. Ten years old. With a big knife.

How I got that knife is quite a story.

This story wouldn’t have happened if I had been eight. Or twelve. Ten is the perfect time for something this strange and scary to happen to a kid. At eight, I would have been too frightened by all that had happened. I also would have been too young and too annoying to have had all that would happen to me actually occur. And at twelve I would have been just old enough not to go along with any of this. I also would have been smart enough to be terrified.

But at ten, it was perfect. Ten year olds have a plan. They are just smart enough to know something is going on in the world, and they want to be part of it. They also know well enough to keep their mouths shut so they don’t embarrass themselves, and just let the older people talk. That’s how we learn.

So at ten, I was old enough that my older brother could stand being around me. He couldn’t bully me anymore, not after I flipped him over onto the ground when he was messing with me and I hurt him. He tried to blame me, but my mom just got on him for trying to fight a ten year old. That went over about as well as an eighteen year old would like. No one was going to find out his little brother had tossed him to the ground and messed up his back.

My older sister’s torment was almost always mental, or verbal. By the time she turned sixteen, she had moved on to ignoring me, which was fine, too.

I guess what I’m saying is, even though I was a bit of a nerd with glasses, no one messed with me anymore. I wasn’t going to screw that up.

So one day when my brother was going out with a girl and her little sisters to go off-roading down in Nags Head Woods, Mom insisted that he take me with him. I knew I wasn’t really wanted on the trip, but I also wasn’t going to pass up a chance to go on an adventure without parents. That’s where all the fun was.

So I ended up bouncing around in the middle of my brother’s rusted Bronco, holding on the the roll bar while I sat between two squealing girls as my brother’s girlfriend looked back at us. I tried to look nonchalant, or whatever it was that meant nonchalant to a kid, but I think I came off as miserable. She grabbed my knee and shook me, “Smile, it’s okay! This will be fun for you!” I smiled, because, like I said, let the adults think they knew everything. I had no special thrill or desire to be stuck between two girls that I already knew from school. There was no way we were going to be holding hands and kissing as we walked along the sound. They had no appeal to me, and I certainly had no attraction from them. Just let me enjoy the ride, lady.

We finally made the turn down toward the old clay and sand road that led deep into Nags Head Woods. I didn’t know much about the place at the time. It got dark and spooky at night, and we all knew that ghosts and Bigfoot all wandered the trees in the darkness. The only time the woods weren’t haunted were when the weird long haired people came out to have bonfires and drink beer. Those were what scared me. At least this trip it was daylight.

About four miles in to the twisty road there is a point where most vehicles give up and turn around. A steep ridge, surprising on the normally flat beach, tucks in to the right side, the sound side, while the sand becomes thick and soft. It is truly impassible by any car. Only tall four wheel drive trucks can make the passage. Evidence of this feat lies at the bottom of the turn, about fifty feet down, where the wreckage of an old Plymouth Valiant was strewn across the bottom of the hill. On one of my many occasions I had to shut up and listen, I heard the story from a local, in his hippy dippy lingo, “Yeah, man, he didn’t make the turn and ended up at the bottom of the hill, dead, man. And get this, even though they didn’t find him until five days later, Stairway To Heaven was still playin’ on his 8-track! No, really!”

I would tell this story for decades afterwards, as if it were my own.

My brother’s Bronco was easily able to pass by Dead Man’s Curve and make its way farther along the sandy road. Just after the curve, he pointed out the occasional access road that cut out from the hillside. “That’s an old graveyard there. The families that lived back here all buried their dead back along this road. That’s why there’s so many ghosts that are in the woods here.” He was trying to scare me. The girls laughed and giggled, frightened by the tales and grossed by the thought of old, dead corpses slowly rotting in their pine box graves. Me, well, I admit to having a fear that ghost pirates may come up out of a foamy ocean late at night and take me away to a watery grave, but ghosts in the woods just didn’t scare me much. What were they going to do, poke me with a stick? My brother had done worse. Besides, ghosts didn’t come out in the daylight.

Seeing I was not impressed, as I really wanted to get to the sound and splash around some, at the next turnoff, he upped his game. “See that grave there?” he pointed to a worn marker, so weathered that there was no way to determine a name or date. The grave was uncared for, most noticeably because a creaky wax myrtle tree had grown fitfully up through the orange-yellow silt sand that graced the woods. We all stared, waiting for the next part of the ghost story, hoping it would be better. “That tree has grown up through the coffin of the dead guy. They say…” he paused for emphasis, “that if you go tickle the tree, it will make the roots tremble, and tickle the corpse, making the dead body laugh, and the tree will start to shake.”

A chorus of “nuh-uhhhh”s came from the girls. “Oh, yeah,” he insisted. “You can go try it!””Noooo!” the girls suddenly got shy and scared. Ugh. Girls.

“How about you?” my brother looked at me.

“Pass.” I didn’t see anything in it for me. I wasn’t going to dance for my brother, or the squealing girls in the back seat. Not like they would be impressed. I had no desire to impress them, anyway. If they thought I was afraid, I didn’t care.

About a mile later, we pulled into the lone spot for a somewhat hidden beach on the sound. There was room for one truck, and it was understood, I learned in later years, that if there already was a truck there, you just kept driving. I also understood in later years just why this practice occurred. This time, we were alone.

Except we weren’t. There were five of us, and that was three too many for my brother and his girlfriend. I tried wandering out into the sound, going farther and farther, just to see if it would ever get above my knees. I think I could have walked all the way to Manteo. I gave up and began walking back in, only to be met with the girls splashing me, teaming up against me, getting my glasses wet so I couldn’t see. I had to constantly worry about my glasses falling off that I could do little to fight back. I found myself wandering onto shore where my sandy but dry towel, festooned with an image of a cartoon Batman, waited to save my skinny body from the soaking I received.

My brother was having none of it. While his girlfriend discussed their options with her younger siblings, he argued with me to take them on a walk up the road, or down the sound toward Jockey’s Ridge. “Look, just go have some fun with them. They want to go down to the sand dunes. Go with them. They want you to go.”One look at the girls and their sister, the younger ones glaring at me, told me this wasn’t true. I didn’t want to go with them, either. “No way. They are just going to splash me more. I don’t need to put up with that.””Well,” the girls walked to within earshot now, trying to discover if we were all going to be saddled with each other. “How about if you go explore that graveyard? Go see if you can make the tree laugh.” I got the picture. Try to dare me into something in front of the girls. “Just go for an hour.”

An hour. An hour alone in the woods. Honestly, I was half tempted. Anything was more fun than this. “I’m not wandering around in the woods alone. There’s creepy people coming through here.””Okay,” he plotted, “I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you my camping knife to take with you.” He had this big long bladed knife in his truck, I was never sure why, like he was going to use it to fight off an invasion on the shore. Maybe just to look cool. I wanted to look cool. ”Look, tell ya what,” I could see the glint in his eyes as he planned his challenge, “You go over to that grave, stay there for an hour, and put my knife in the grave, then you can have it.”

Part of me screamed out wanting to say, “I’ve seen that movie, too!” where the guy is challenged to plant a knife in the grave of a killer, and then it gets caught in his coat, and the guy has a heart attack, yeah yeah. But then, I could get a big knife. I started thinking, as well as part of my mind knowing he’d just try to take it back anyway. Still, big knife.

His girlfriend sealed the deal. “Go on, it’ll be fun. There’s nothing there to scare you. Nothing at all!” She had this big stupid grin on her round Marcia Brady face, laughing at the little kid.”Okay, gimme the knife.”

With a lot of pretend parent lectures in front of his girlfriend and the little sisters, he handed over the knife in a sheath with a web belt and string. I just took it and tucked the whole thing in the back of my shorts. This was a trophy, not a toy, I tried to say. The girls were not impressed, as usual, and I didn’t care, as usual. I was free and on my own for an hour. Heck, I’d just go put the knife there and then go find the beach somewhere else.

It took a while to wander the sandy road back to the last entrance we passed, which was fine with me, to eat up more time. I wondered if anyone would come by. What would they think about seeing a ten year old boy in shorts and wet hair wandering a dirt road with a knife in his hand. I did wonder about some creep chasing me in his truck, screaming over his CB’s PA speaker at me. I would just dodge him, puncture his tires, and watch as his truck went plummeting off the road. Ten year olds. We always had a plan.

But I got to the cemetery with not a living soul seeing me. There it was, straight in the middle of the dusty open space, the grave with the tree. It was one of about twelve graves there, pretty much in the middle. They didn’t really lay out the grounds in straight lines back then, I guessed. I pulled the knife from the sheath and started to place it in the ground near the grave. I’m not going to lie. It was a little creepy. The only things there besides me were a dozen corpses, dried and decaying in their graves. The thought that they could come to life just for a laugh might seem ludicrous, but I was ten, and had only my imagination as my guide. I thought that it might happen. Little would I know just how assured that event would be.

The tree, what looked like a dried and half dead maple, with thin twisted limbs growing up from the hard packed ground, branches that looked like those pictures of a human body with the muscles exposed, only yellowed and scaly, it looked more like it would split in two or fall over than tremble at my touch. But I had to try it. No one was around. I could make up anything later. But I would know. So I reached out and tickled a twisted knot on the base.

There was no wind. The other branches, with only a few green leaves scattered about, barely cast a shadow to shade me. My hands scratched more than poked, but I did it. Then I felt a scratching at my shoulder. One lone dry branch, barely a twig, had reached town as if it were caught on a sleeve or something, scratching at my shoulder. I realized I wasn’t wearing my shirt. It was tucked in my pants.

The tree had reached down and was slightly, gently shaking just over my head.

I stepped back. The tree stopped. It had to be the wind. Or I had caught the branch in my hair. Or anything other than what my stupid brother had made up on the spot and used so that he could kiss his girlfriend in solitude.

I was ten. I had a plan.

I went back over and started tickling the tree again.

At first, the branches were still. Yeah, I imagined this.

Then the branches began to move.

But what was worse was the sound. I heard it, deep in the ground, a raspy chuckle, like an old man coughing as he laughed at a dirty joke. I stepped back again. This time two steps, away from that tree. In my fear and haste, I trod upon one of the other graves, but didn’t notice that, yet. The grave in front of me kept laughing, the tree kept shaking. I wasn’t near it anymore. I really, really wanted to be even farther away.

I decided to test out my running skills in my beat up Keds but somehow I was rooted to the spot. My feet weren’t cooperating with my brain as it screamed at them to run. “Why aren’t you listening?!” came the plea from my head. It was a desperate one. Kids know that final feeling, true terror, it’s horrible in kids, because they just can’t cope with the cold shock that something really bad is about to happen. This isn’t an “I’m going to get in trouble” feeling. It’s that feeling of being washed out to sea in a rip tide, into the deep water, and you’re not ever, ever getting back. A kid will do everything and anything at this time. It’s a bit like going mad.

I know this because I looked down and saw two bony hands squeezing my feet to the ground.

I was already out of breath, but I found a way to scream. I don’t know why every person on the whole island didn’t hear it. It was high pitched, screeching, and embarrassing, like a little girl scream, as I heard it somewhere deep in my head. I cut it off as soon as I heard myself, because the only thing worse than being attacked by a skeleton was sounding like a little girl. I think that’s what made something change in me. I shut up and pulled. When the fingers gripped tighter, I knew I had to do more, so I knelt down and pulled that stupid knife out of its sheath and started hacking at those dry, bony fingers. I stabbed at them, right into the wrist of one hand, and was rewarded with a big scab of dry skin coming off, with a popping of bone from those bits in the wrist. The dirt wouldn’t give as much. It was all dry and hard, only breaking apart as this thing forced it’s way up higher through the earth. I started noticing that just in front of me, the dirt was starting to crack and raise in a crusty bubble. More of this thing was coming up. I had to get free. I jammed the knife deep into the wrist and twisted until I got a good satisfying pop, and the hand, such as it was, came off from the bony arm now shoving its way out of the ground.

I switched to the other hand still holding on. By now it had begun to squeeze enough that it hurt. It felt like thick wires were cutting into my foot. I was afraid it would just squeeze and squeeze until it snapped my little kid foot off. At least then I’d be free. I didn’t know if I could run or limp or hop, but then at least I could get away. It was a plan. Not a good one. So I stabbed again. I wanted to keep my foot.

I got the blade in deep enough and tried the same trick, twisting and hoping for a pop. The hand seemed to shudder and shake, but it let go. It didn’t come off, but I was free. I immediately realized I probably should have cut that thing off, because the corpse started to use the hand to push itself up out of the ground.

All this time, while I’m panting, struggling and in terror, I never notice that there still is this laughing coming from the other grave, the one with the tree. That stupid dead guy was laughing at me. I hated old people laughing at little kids. And this guy was really, really old. His friend coming out of the ground wasn’t any better.

I watched in horror as the ground finally broke and the head of the corpse came up out from his grave. He was more flesh than skeleton. I figured he’d be all bones, but he had a lot of face and hair left on him, which made him look much, much worse.

I tried to scoot back as I had fallen backwards after freeing myself. I noticed that I was sliding over yet another grave. Kids move fast, real fast, in a panic, and I was in a serious panic right now. I slid myself off the grave, lifting my butt off the ground. I wasn’t going to let any ghoul grab me there, that was for sure. My legs weren’t working well, and my feet ached. I was only able to get to my knees as I watched that sick zombie ghoul force its way out of the sand. Bits of the fine yellow silt, a clingy and grainy kind of sand that made its way across the island, totally unlike the off-white beach sand, stuck in the stretched skin and long straggly hair of the thing. It looked at me, like it was smiling, but a smile full of hate. I had seen that face before.

All kids had, I thought. Older kids, adults, all bullies, all knowing that they can hurt and tease us kids, make fun of them, make the kids cry, that was the face they made when they kicked dogs and pulled the tails of cats. That was the face they made when they thought they were winning. I couldn’t stand that face.

My legs got better just then.

I was able to stand up, but I wasn’t going to run. Not now. I had to stay for an hour. I probably had forty minutes to go. I decided then and there, this guy was going to have less than that. Before he was halfway out, I ran toward to him, jumping that last grave, just in case, and I kicked that stupid smiling zombie in his stupid smiling face.

I was rewarded with a satisfying crack that sent his head and torso bending backwards at what would have been a painful angle, had he been alive. I think it only inconvenienced him. I also was punished with a new sharp ache in my foot where it had hit his bony jaw. Lesson learned.

He pushed himself farther up out of the ground, now past his hips, and he was trying to get his legs out when I kicked again. This time I whacked him good in the face with the flat end of my shoe. That was more satisfying, but less damaging. I hopped around to his back. I think I had broken something in my foot, but what was I going to do about that now. I planted my feet and then aimed at his upper back, kicking with all my strength.

That thing looked like it folded in half, the wrong way. Unfortunately, I think I freed it from the hole it was coming out of. But now he was on the ground. I watched, rubbing my foot through my shoe, as he turned over in the dirt. He still had that stupid smile on his face. He should have been afraid. If he knew what I was going to do to him, try to mess with me, I’ll give this thing something to smile about.

He tried to get up, which was terrifying. Seeing an undead corpse rise up, ragged clothes tearing, dried and tightened skin pulled over brittle bones, well, not something a ten year old really plans for. I wasn’t going to let this thing get up. I had seen enough scary movies to know not to let that skeleton pop out of the closet and chase you through an old dark house. I kicked out at a bony knee sticking out of a cheap pair of pants, sending the leg bending sideways. For good measure, when his head went down from the kick, I swung with my knife, my knife, and chucked him in the jaw. The thing went down with that.

His posture looked pretty familiar to me. I looked like that just a few, hours, minutes, ago, I don’t know, it was a blur. He was trying to get up, but that one stump of an arm where I popped off his hand at the wrist wasn’t helping any. He couldn’t balance on the thin stump well, and teetered as he tried to rise. I looked at where his severed hand was. Kids can’t help it, staring at the gore, like we have to, knowing we’ll regret it. I was surprised it had pretty much turned to a clump of dirt and bone, barely recognizable. By then I knew what I had to do, as long as I could do it without this thing biting me with those rotten icky teeth. That’s what scares kids, being bitten by skeletons.

I tried to swing my knife at the ghoul, but his one good hand came up to block me and grab my arm. I shook with terror. I wasn’t going to let him grab me and pull me toward those teeth. I jerked out of his grasp and immediately stabbed at his face, my hand coming down like a hammer. I felt the blade scrape across his face, grazing what was left of his nose, chiseling off a couple teeth, before sticking partially into his chest. It didn’t do much damage, but I don’t think he liked it much. I wasn’t thrilled with it either. Feeling those teeth come out through the vibrating knife blade was uncomfortable.

Instead of getting up, the thing lunged forward. He grabbed me by my ankle with his one good hand and started squeezing again. I tried to yank away, afraid of those smiling teeth, thinking he was going to bite me, when I realized he had a few less than before, at least. I didn’t really know what was going through his mind, if he even had one. He just seemed like he wanted to torment me. So instead of pulling with my leg, I pushed. I kicked out at his whole body. It lifted up off the ground. He was lighter than I expected since he had a lot less flesh on him. He went flying back, over the last grave, in a jumble of twisted body parts.

His head was bent at a really bad angle, as was one of his knees. I knew that none of this mattered. He wouldn’t quit until he was the same dust and bone that his hand was. I was dirty, covered in a horrid cold sweat and dusted with this icky sand and soil that was stirred up from his grave. My feet hurt, my hand hurt, my heart pounded, and my head was dizzy. I felt massively sick to my stomach, but couldn’t throw up. That would take too long, and I had other things to do.

So I ran toward to him and jumped on him.

I fought like a kid. My arms flailed in wild circles, pounding on him as I screamed. I wailed on the guy. I didn’t care if I made contact, as long as I kept swinging and he couldn’t grab me and fight back. Finally, panting and terrified, I just gave in, grabbed the knife with both hands and brought it down as hard as I could.

When I felt it stop, I gave it a twist.

He stopped moving after that.

I looked down at my handiwork. The knife had gone down trough the nose of his skull, slightly upwards, following the curve of the blade. The hilt had cracked the cheekbones and sunk deeper into his head.

He wasn’t smiling now.

I was on top of him with my legs wrapped around his chest. I felt him deflate, like squeezing a sleeping bag to wrap it up in a roll. His body literally turned to dust under me. For some reason, the dusty remains of a dead body were more creepy than even a zombie, to me. I jumped up and dusted myself off.

It took me a good five minutes, or a couple of years, to get myself together. I was in shock, I knew, and there was nothing I could do about it except let it wear off. No one was going to bring me a blanket like on Emergency! I waited until I felt better, and then waited a little more.

When I was finally able to stand up, I saw that the corpse was pretty much nothing but dust and a few remnants of bone, all dried and bleached yellow. He looked like someone had scattered chicken bones out after a party. I gathered up my newfound courage, and tried to spit on him. Nothing came out.

The source of all this, that tree, stood still, no longer trembling, no laughing came from beneath the ground. I walked over to it and stood right on the middle of the mound of earth. Then a grabbed the tree and shook it. It’s brittle branches and phthisic dry leaves seemed to gasp for life that wasn’t coming.

“Who’s laughing now?” I nearly shouted at the earth. I shook the tree and pulled at it. Short, stunted, and dry, with its roots finding little purchase outside the long ago turned earth of the grave, it wiggled in the ground. “You think this is funny, huh?!” I kicked at the tree, then spun, my imitation of a kung fu strike that did more damage than I expected. The tree began to topple. I saw the roots come up, pulling from the shallow ground. I half expected another corpse to pop up with them, but all that appeared was the same useless dirt and dust that I had seen before. I let the tree fall to the side. Everything was silent.

I looked at the upended earth and yelled, “Where’s your god now?!”

About a half hour later, my brother found me out in front of the cemetery, pitching rocks across the road toward the trees by the sound. He had driven up with everyone in his truck. No one looked very happy to be there. One of the girls had stepped on a broken beer bottle and cut her ankle, so now they had to go home. I didn’t make anything better by being there covered in dirt and sweat. “How did you get so dirty?!” my brother asked, perplexed and exasperated.

I shrugged my shoulders. “It was your idea for me to go here.”

“I guess you never went in, did you? Too scared?” he was trying to find a way to get his knife, and some of his dignity with his girlfriend, back.

I merely shrugged again and motioned for him to come see.

They piled out of the Bronco, except for one of the girls, who sat forlornly ignored in her time of crisis. I walked them over to the tree to show them where it had fallen and died. “That stupid tree,” I began, “that thing is dead as a post. It didn’t even go into a grave. Look, I touched it and it fell over.” And the tree certainly did that. It even was shriveled up, with leaves turning brown and dying as I spoke. “But I came here. Look.”

Right at the base of the grave, in the hard dirt, I had carved my name. As an exclamation point, I had stabbed the knife, my knife, into the ground. My brother started to reach for it, but I was much faster. I snatched it up and held it by my side. He tried to take it from me.

I wasn’t going to reward him. I knew if I pulled away, turned my back, if I pouted or pleaded I’d look like a little kid who was trying to get his way in a sea of adults. So I spun the knife in my hand, just a little twist, like I was getting it comfortable. And ready. Then instead of turning away, I stepped toward him. “I kept my end.” That was all I said, but I was the only one who had battled zombies today. He just dealt with some annoying girls. Besides, his girlfriend was watching. She stood over where the chicken bones were.My brother tried to argue, but the best he could come up with was, “Mom’s never gonna let you keep it.”I replied quickly, “So, let Mom take it from me.”

So, the day ended no better than it started, with promising hope mostly dashed. Mom took my picture. She thought it was so funny, me all dirty with that big knife in my hand. She actually laughed at my brother when he tried to get her to make me give it back. She was used to me showing up dirty after playing, usually with grass stained jeans and scraped elbows instead of dirty knees and scratched shoulders. Since I didn’t actually tell on my brother, and he couldn’t do much without embarrassing himself over a ten year old boy getting the best of him, pretty much everything was let go as just another day in the life of our family.

My mom did try to figure out how I got so dirty, but when she asked me what happened, I thought back to what my brother’s girlfriend had said to me, and then what I had said to her later. She was standing over the remains of that thing that tried to get me, now just a bunch of scattered bones, flakes of skin, and dust. She screwed up that stupid Marcia Brady face of hers into a sneer and asked, “Ewww, what is all this?”

I looked at her, dirty, shirtless, knife in one hand, and all tough in my ten year old glasses wearing self, and said, “Nothing.

“Nothing at all.”