FLETCHER’S GRAVE by Laurence Munnikhuysen
November 30, 2007 Short stories Tags: Laurence Munnikhuysen
The Early Sun Cemetery was created sometime during World War I, and according to records no one has been buried there since 1945. It is about the size of a basketball court and adjacent to a small library which is located across the street from an abandoned Naval Ship yard. There are several old oaks in the middle of the yard and they provide a porous canopy across the hundred or so headstones. The stones are cracked and chipped and many are illegible because years of moss and fungus have faded the original engravings. However, the grass, what little there is, is always neatly trimmed and dead limbs and trash are always picked up by the library’s janitor. In the sunlight the graveyard appears well kept and pleasant, but moonlight shadows cast by a neighboring church’s bell tower and oak trees create a different appearance when the sun falls. The yard appears to illuminate in night with the touch of the moon’s rays. (more…)