Flash Fiction: The Ghost Cow

Photo by Skitterphoto from Pexels. Written for DVerse Poets’ Prosery #7.

Based on a true story.

144 words

A cow is screaming across the arroyo as the four of us lie among the graves. We’re scarved and swaddled against the cold, but my toes are growing numb. I imagine us stacked on top of the other bodies, my feet resting above an ancient businessman’s head, my stretched-out hands meeting the bony fingers of a long-buried grandmother.

That cow doesn’t appreciate the night sky. Irregular mournful bellows interrupt our star-gazing. The sound reminds me of ghosts. Maybe the cow has seen one. Maybe it senses us, lying in a graveyard at 11:45 at night and wonders what on earth we’re doing here. I’m beginning to wonder that too.

The bushes rustle and whisper with near-human voices. Someone trips over me.

“Where did you go? We were looking for you!”

The others have returned from their wandering. They thought the ghost cow was haunting them.

~H