The Lodge--Chapter One

(After being forced to take a break during the day today due to feeling so crappy, I started the ghost story I've been considering the past couple days. I have most of it mapped out either in head or on paper, but we'll see how it turns out... Feel free to give critical feedback. I seriously doubt I will seek publication as it is just for fun, but you never know. Anyway, here's chapter one.)

The only thing remotely special about Levitt Patterson was his name. The moniker had always left him feeling overshadowed. It seemed to him that someone burdened with the name Levitt Patterson should be a politician or an actor—maybe a news anchor. At the very least, it belonged to a person that should be good looking.

Levitt wasn’t overly self-critical; however, he wouldn’t lie to himself either. He knew his limp brown hair, pale blue eyes, and pasty complexion weren’t overtly attractive, but neither were they repulsive. The same could be said for his slight build. At five foot and ten inches, he was the tallest in his family, but in any other setting, he was the perfect height for being overlooked. He’d tried lifting weights for a time—right after his relationship ended, hoping that a new improved body might be enough to incite reconciliation. After a few weeks, though, he got bored and felt that instead of gaining muscle, he was really just whittling away at his already boyish frame.

Sadly, at thirty-three years of age, his professional life was following the same pattern as his physical appearance. He wasn’t an outstanding teacher, but neither was he the worst. Most of his students scored in the satisfactory range on standardized testing. And if the students in his classroom happened to fall asleep more often than not during the day, at least he could boast that he rarely had disciplinary problems. He was always arrive ten minutes before his students and never left early. In fact, he often would stay after school for a few minutes to clean the desks and counters. He wondered at the teachers that always seemed to be at school before him and were still there when he left, but he didn’t dwell on it to any great extent.

There wasn’t really one particular thing Levitt could point out about himself that he felt wasn’t adequate; neither was there anything he could think of that made him unique or special. In fact, the only thing that had ever made Levitt feel like more than he was had walked out the door over two years previous.

Jason Carpenter had been everything Levitt was not. Tall, dark, handsome, funny, dynamic. For the first several months of their relationship, Levitt kept waiting for the day when Jason would walk through the door followed by a camera crew to film his reaction upon discovering he was the subject of some real life psychology experiment. Despite not understanding what had caused Jason to fall in love with him, after a time, Levitt began to accept that he had found the one thing that made him exceptional, the one thing that would give his life meaning, the one thing that would lift his mediocre life to heights impossible to reach on his own.

No sooner had Levitt grown safe and grounded in this fairy tale of endings, than Jason left, seemingly unable to any longer see the things that Levitt couldn’t find in himself to begin with.

After Jason’s departure, Levitt discovered he truly did have some exceptional qualities. He was capable of grief and desperation that would have shattered most men.

After a time, he returned to his daily routine and to his students—somehow managing to approach each situation with even less lack-luster enthusiasm than he had prior.

It was with this same mindset that Levitt stared hypnotically at the trees passing by, his forehead pressed against the window. Occasionally, he would emit a grunt or groan as the bus shifted and the student next to him would jerk over, her shoulder pressing into his ribs.

By the time the kids started singing the fiftieth verse of Ninety-Nine Beers on the Wall (which Ms. Needle had made them change to Ninety-Nine Sodas—Levitt couldn’t decided which made her more of a pratt—that she had altered the word Beer in the song or that she was swaying and singing twice as loud an any of the students), Levitt was already adding up the hours until he would be able to return home. He’d taken the sixth graders to OutDoor Lab for the past seven years. They did it every fall. This year was the earliest they had ever gone, it was only the first week in September, and he was struggling to find the small molecule of excitement he typically managed to scrounge up. He hadn’t had his students in class long enough to even learn their names, let alone to have formed any modicum of a relationship with the them.

Five days. Four nights. Four long nights. He could get through it—just set the autopilot and go with the flow. Hike a few trails, lead a few groups about wildlife footprints (why city kids would need to know the distinction between a bobcat and a fox, he couldn’t fathom), dissect a couple owl pellets, and he would be back home in Denver. Back home to a three-day weekend in fact. He had only realized that morning that the following Monday was Labor Day. While it didn’t make up for having to be one of the chaperons, it did help to have something to look forward to.

In the past, his school had always gone to Fort Wentworth for OutDoor Lab. This year, for some reason, the district had decided that Scott Elementary would attend at their second location, Boyer Lodge.

As the bus rounded it’s final corner and Levitt was beginning to feel the slight tuggings of nausea in his stomach, the ranch came into focus in the front windshield. At first, he started to rest his head back on the window pane, overwhelmed by the thought of helping navigate nearly a hundred sixth graders as they unloaded their luggage and found their cabins, but then a building at the back of the valley nestled in-between the mountains called to him. He sat up, unconsciously leaning forward. What looked like a small log castle sat near the base of the mountain, overlooking all the lesser cabins and structures. It’s sharply peaked roof jutted upward as if it were an extension of the mountain range itself. Each line and curve of the building seemed to declare its superiority, while the wrap-around log porch hinted at the promise of hominess and warmth inside.

Levitt stared transfixed until the bus lurched to a sudden halt and the students stood up, blocking his view as they shuffled in anticipation, waiting to exit. He stifled the irritation that shot through him and reminded himself that this week was about the kids. Nothing else, just the kids. That mantra didn’t last long as his toes got crushed beneath a monstrous sixth grader barraging through the bus aisle.

“Sorry, Mr. Patterson.” The boy mumbled without looking back.

Levitt sat back down, content to wait until the last student exited before once again attempting to step out of his seat.

As he stepped cautiously down the bus steps, he cast another glance out the windshield. The windows of the house seemed to wink at him as they twinkled in the midmorning sun.