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There was something eerie about Wicked Park. Maybe it was the name. Or the fact that the neighboring cemetery was expanded not eight years before so that the last headstone laid merely ten feet from the back gate of the playground. To Thomas, it was the toys left behind, an action figure or a dump truck; they seldom turned up the next morning.
Minho insisted that the janitor came by to clean it all up every night. And yet, when Thomas begged his mother to talk to the aforementioned janitor about his missing possessions, she informed him that the park was mostly maintained by high school volunteers over the weekend. It was a Wednesday. Minho didn't have much to say about the misplaced toys after that. Thomas thought he must still be sour about losing his Rat Man action figure. Minho was the type to be sour about things like that.
Thomas made a point not to bring anything with him to the park after that. The sandbox wasn't so much fun without trucks to run down sand ramps, but Gally had taught him to build castles soon after, so it was alright then. Gally never really had any toys, and he also never really had lunch either, come to think of it.
That was the way things were in Wicked Park. Most kids arrived there promptly after school, every day. They'd play and play until they were worn out, or until the sun came down, whichever came first. Thomas always waited until dark, because that's when Minho's parents came. Then, he'd walk home himself.
But apparently, Thomas found out just before he arrived, that Minho wasn't allowed to go to the park for a week. Or at least not until he learned to play nice with Gally. They were the kind of best friends that never got along. But Gally wasn't present that day either. No one was.
Thomas moped over halfhearted sand castles and empty swing sets. Standing up, he began at the entrance and walked the perimeter of the park, running his hand across the gate as he passed, making his fingers flutter until they were numb. As he approached the back corner, Thomas took a sudden right, avoiding the area entirely. The cemetery lied only a few feet beyond that gate.
Brenda had once said that you had to hold your breath if you get too close to a graveyard, or else you might breathe in dead people spirits. It became a popular game, after that, to dare one another to touch the back gate. Kids like Aris never made it that far for fear of ghosts, which was understandable. Kids like Minho boasted success, although they held their breath all the way and brushed the chain link for only a second before dashing to safety to regain their composure.
The sun was near setting, allowing the gate to cast a convenient shadow that outlined the park ground that was considered forbidden. Thomas would leave soon. While he'd occasionally draw out his play session until his mother was forced to come there herself to retrieve him, Thomas had the feeling that he'd better head home early. The park was much more eerie when he was alone. Then suddenly, he wasn't alone.
As Thomas reached the other back corner, he noticed the unmistakable figure of a boy standing in the corner without a trace of fear, or any emotion at all. Once the local high school dismissed for the day, certain groups of teenagers would arrive, laughing and swearing and climbing up the gates into the cemetery for nothing other than the rebellion of it all. They were not afraid like Thomas was. This was the low point of the day, when the gentle air was smothered with teenage havoc and mischief. Although they usually left not half an hour afterwards, once they had their fun.
The older kids were the only ones daring enough to loiter near the back gate for so long. Yet, this boy didn't seem much older than Thomas, only seven or eight, maybe younger. Their eyes met silently, as if they were studying one another. This unbelievably courageous- or perhaps ignorant of the neighboring ghost site- boy had an unmistakable appearance. His blond hair laid wispy and white at the ends, and his eyes were strange and dull, but undoubtedly brown. In addition to a heavy brown coat, he wore a red scarf up to his chin. Not only that, Thomas could see the straps of a backpack, with a leash trailing behind it. The end of that leash was tightly wrapped around a link on the gate, most likely in order to limit the range of the boy's movement. Thomas frowned at that, finally speaking,
"You a dog?"
"No," the blond boy's voice rose near the end, indicating an accent, or perhaps an incredulous question.
"Well you're chained up like one," Thomas didn't mean any offense, although his observation surely could have come off that way.
"It's ‘cause I'm 'hyperactive'," he wiggled two fingers on each hand like quotation marks, seemingly unfazed by the comparison. Definitely an accent.
"You know what hyperactive means?"
"No. I never got to get told," the blond shrugged.
"It means you won't shut up," Thomas stated bluntly, yet somehow, he still didn't particularly mean to offend.
"Oh," the leashed boy blinked, "I am hyperactive,"
"Don't look like it to me," Thomas pointed out, noting his unassuming demeanor.
"Well I was," he said, and that was that. Thomas didn't quite understand, but he didn't dwell on it. They continued back and forth for some time,
"What's your name anyway?"
"Newt,"
"Like the lizard?"
"Like the scientist,"
"There’s no scientist named Newt!"
"Yeah there is! My mom said there was and that's why I'm named that. What's your name?"
"I'm Thomas, and I'm called Tom," Newt considered this for a moment,
"Well I'm Newtmas, and I'm called Newt,"
They both giggled and the strange, tense quality of their unfamiliarity towards one another faded. It was the first time Thomas saw Newt with anything other than a blank expression or a slight frown. The joke seemed to lighten the mood now, as if they had finally become friends, which was sort of easy when you’re a kid anyway.
"You wanna play, Tommy?" Thomas' face lit up, and he nodded quickly.
"We can go play in the sandbox. I can make castles now,"
Suddenly, Newt was frowning again. Then again, even his smile rather looked like half a frown anyway.
"I can't go that far," Newt tugged on his leash in explanation.
"Oh." Thomas mirrored the downcast expression, before resuming his wide-eyed, curious default, "Then, how far can you go?"
Newt considered this for a moment before letting the leash fall from his hand. He began stepping forward towards Thomas until he couldn't advance any further without the straps pulling into his chest. Newt fiddled with the clasp in the middle, although he already knew it proved too challenging to be undone. He looked to the where his new friend stood before him,
“This far."
"But that's not even out of the shadow!"
"That's as far as I can go!"
"But there's no slide or swings or anything! And you hafta breathe in spirits all the time!"
Both of the boys were thoroughly frustrated and confused. Newt was especially confused by Thomas’s apparent fixation on supernatural respiration.
He’d never heard of anything like that before, and he felt that he ought to have if it was true. The solution, then, was to sit down and talk. Newt sat criss-cross, and Thomas sat with his legs stretched out. Evidently, the stark contrast in lighting wasn't the only difference between them. Thomas started first, speaking matter-of-factually,
"Don't you know? There's a grave yard behind that gate. If you get too close, you breathe in dead people spirits,"
Newt still didn’t quite understand. Of course, he lived in a different part of town than everyone else, and he didn’t often talk to people like Thomas. Maybe that made all the difference.
"Well, so what if you breathe a spirit? What happens? Plus, there's toys here so it’s not so bad. One night, there was a Rat Man action figure,"
"Hey! That's Minho's! You have to give it back. He misses it," Thomas demanded. Minho was only ever allowed one new toy a month, and that sort of thing was important to consider when playing with other people’s things.
"I don't have it. Winston does. I think he only comes here at night,"
Newt looked back at the gate for a moment. Thomas looked back as well, although he didn't see anything. He understood now how Newt could be anything close to hyperactive. He fidgeted more than baby Chuck did, always looking behind him, as if he were checking for ghosts, which was almost silly to think about now that Thomas had gotten more comfortable in the otherwise desolate park,
"I'm not allowed to go here at night. Are you?"
"I only come here at night,"
"It's not night right now,"
"Well it will be. It's getting dark and the park is sorta empty,"
Looking up at the sky, it was true. For every inch that the sun went down, the shadow of the back gate loomed closer. Thomas scooted back every time he realized, and in turn, Newt scooted forward.
"So what happens when you breathe a spirit? You didn't say,"
"I dunno," Thomas realized it just then. Brenda never told anyone that much, just that she had learned it from her uncle Jorge.
"They get inside you and control your body I think,"
Newt looked down at his hands, twiddling his thumbs absentmindedly,
"I don't think they can do that,"
The playground was growing dimmer now, and the streetlights would soon go on. As Newt realized this, he hopped to his feet,
"I think you have to go,"
Thomas reluctantly stood as well, brushing wood chips off his shorts, and straightening out his blue t-shirt,
"Aw, how come? Won't you be lonely by yourself?"
Newt shook his head quickly, looking back at the gate, then to Thomas. There it was again, the looking back and forth. Perhaps Newt was waiting for his mother to call for him,
"It's getting dark. You have to. Alby and Teresa and Winston are coming, so it's okay,"
Sensing the insistence in Newt's voice, Thomas took a step back,
"Okay, but you'll come back and play tomorrow, right? I'll bring toys, so we don't hafta go on the swings or anything,"
"Ok! But you have to go now. Please, Tommy? Please?" Newt smiled sadly, but didn't stop nervously glancing behind, not even for a second, and it was a wonder he didn’t get dizzy.
"Fine, fine. Bye, Newt!"
Thomas beamed at his new friend. Panicked as the boy looked, Thomas wondered if he should stay. Finally, he concluded that maybe he was the problem anyway, seeing the relief in Newt’s face as he slipped on his backpack,
"See ya, Tommy,"
Thomas turned to leave, taking not two steps forward before deciding to wave and shout a final goodbye. But when he turned back, Newt was gone. Thomas didn't think much of it at the time. Perhaps Newt needed to leave in a hurry, and so he ran off as soon as they parted. And yet, when Thomas excitedly recounted the events to Brenda the next morning as they hung up their backpacks before school, she looked at him blankly. Thomas got those types of looks a lot, especially from Brenda. She shook her head,
"But what about his leash? I mean, how'd—Morning, Fry!—how’d he keep moving up if he already said that’s as far as he can go?"
Thomas wondered too. He'd ask Newt tomorrow. But Newt wasn't there the next day. Or the next. And when Minho invited Thomas to visit his cousin Ben's grave that weekend, Thomas couldn't help but wander off to explore the very back corner that tapered off from loose, black dirt to the familiar red cedar chips that somehow always ended up in his shoes. His breath wouldn't hold no matter how hard he tried, and he almost turned tail, but Thomas couldn't leave Minho after he'd promised to come. Besides, Newt had told him that spirits couldn't do anything Brenda said, and Newt seemed like he knew about things like that.
Furthermore, Thomas knew he wasn't supposed to look when Minho cried, and he always did every time they came to see Ben, so he kept his head forward. Thomas never did get to properly meet Ben, and he wasn’t even really sure what happened in the first place. All Thomas knew was that he wasn’t supposed to mention it or Minho would get sulky again, and there was no consoling him when he got like that.
Funnily enough, it wasn't so scary now that he was on the other side of the gate and the Saturday morning sun didn't cast its ominous shadow. The more he walked, the more he didn’t think it was such a big deal after all. The very last headstone was planted right behind the unmistakable gatepost that Newt had once stood before. A peculiar feeling that he couldn't quite place washed over Thomas as he read the inscription.
Isaac Newton 2009-2015