Member-only story
Laughing People.
A short story about life and living.
“Of all the ghosts, the ghosts of our old loves are the worst.” Arthur Conan Doyle
Minnie heard them as she walked past the old stone foundation and lichen-covered charred timbers. She heard their voices in the wind, the trees, the water lapping against the crumbling wharf. She called these voices the “laughing people” because everyone seemed to laugh back then.
This was before the Great Lodge burned down, of course. Everything died after that. Her mother and father, aunts and uncles, the community itself. They’d all worked at the Great Lodge in one capacity or another. Minnie had followed them. She was in her early twenties, pretty and outgoing. She was eighty now. She’d come back to see the remains one last time.
They were both very happy. Minnie wondered if that’s all they knew.
Her grandsons brought her over in the launch earlier. She walked with the help of a cane up to where the pool used to be. It was all filled in with leaves, loam and other detritus now. Winnie remembered a young man doing handstands on the three-tiered fiving platform for his girlfriend. They were both very happy. Minnie wondered if that’s all they knew.