THE MARTHA KINGMAN
CEMETERY
"THIS GRAVEYARD HAD ITS BEGINNING IN A
PROMISE BETWEEN TWO YOUNG LOVERS,
MARTHA KINGMAN AND LEWIS KINGMAN,
WHO WERE SCHOOLMATES. THEY AGREED
THAT THEY WOULD BE BURIED UNDER A
GREAT OAK TREE WHICH STOOD HERE.
"MARTHA, WHO MARRIED LEWIS AT FIFTEEN,
DIED IN 1871 AT THE AGE OF TWENTY-SIX.
HERS WAS THE FIRST GRAVE ON THIS SITE,
WHICH LEWIS LAID OUT AS A FAMILY BURY-
ING GROUND. HE WENT ON TO FIND THE
TOWN OF KINGMAN IN 1882.
"THE PRESENT MONUMENT IS NOT THE
ORIGINAL, DESIGNED BY KINGMAN, BUT A
LARGER ONE ERECTED BY THE CITY IN 1883.
ITS BASE COVERS THE GRAVES OF KINGMAN,
HIS WIFE, HIS FATHER AND CHILD AND OF
HIS GRANDCHILDREN.
"THE GRAVEYARD REMAINS THE PROPERTY
OF THE CITY AND CONTINUES TO BE A FAMILY
BURYING GROUND."
Cute story.CEMETERY
"THIS GRAVEYARD HAD ITS BEGINNING IN A
PROMISE BETWEEN TWO YOUNG LOVERS,
MARTHA KINGMAN AND LEWIS KINGMAN,
WHO WERE SCHOOLMATES. THEY AGREED
THAT THEY WOULD BE BURIED UNDER A
GREAT OAK TREE WHICH STOOD HERE.
"MARTHA, WHO MARRIED LEWIS AT FIFTEEN,
DIED IN 1871 AT THE AGE OF TWENTY-SIX.
HERS WAS THE FIRST GRAVE ON THIS SITE,
WHICH LEWIS LAID OUT AS A FAMILY BURY-
ING GROUND. HE WENT ON TO FIND THE
TOWN OF KINGMAN IN 1882.
"THE PRESENT MONUMENT IS NOT THE
ORIGINAL, DESIGNED BY KINGMAN, BUT A
LARGER ONE ERECTED BY THE CITY IN 1883.
ITS BASE COVERS THE GRAVES OF KINGMAN,
HIS WIFE, HIS FATHER AND CHILD AND OF
HIS GRANDCHILDREN.
"THE GRAVEYARD REMAINS THE PROPERTY
OF THE CITY AND CONTINUES TO BE A FAMILY
BURYING GROUND."
It all falls apart the second you search Lewis Kingman on Google and discover the man was all over the Western United States during the early 1870's. He was integral to mapping out the railway system. So did he just carry the woman's body all around the Oregon Trail or whatever? Or did he drop her wherever and left? Regardless of what actually happened, this story is bullshit. This graveyard is bullshit. Everything is bullshit.
Scout Pfeiffer sat on a headstone facing the grave marker overlooking a moss-ridden crypt. She spat, chucked a rock at the grave marker. It bounced off the corner with a loud ping and tumbled into the weeds skirting the along the old pavement.
The cemetery was dark, darker still from the new moon and the dense clouds. Dark nights for ended lives. The street lamps from the street were the graveyard's only source of light. They worked relatively well, bathing the rows of tombstones in a sickly-sodium yellow. It reminded Scout of a dreadful straight-to-dvd zombie movie she saw as a child. Well, at least the street lamps meant she wasn't stumbling over her own two feet like a blind idiot. Small wonders.
... Scout was in a bad mood. Actually, understatement of the century. Scout was in a shit mood, because her cunt Mother had to go get engaged to some beefcake asshole without even bothering to tell her own flesh and blood about it. Jesus. If she wasn't such a goody two-shoe Girl Scout she'd be chucking rocks through some poor bastard's window. Maybe her mother did raise her right.
She threw another, smaller rock. It hit the corner again and fell into the grass, out of sight. Scout grunted.
Chucking rocks around a graveyard though? Yeah, nobody's going to get upset over some kid hanging around here in the middle of the night. Scout knew from experience. She has never been caught hanging around this graveyard, not in her two years of living in this rattown. So, yeah. What were the chances of 'them' catching her now?
When she first moved to Kingman, she found herself gravitating towards the local cemetery (the ONLY cemetery). This was during her period of shutting herself inside her room and talking to nobody, so hanging around graveyards was a step up. Y'know. At least she was getting out. Scout always found herself drawn towards ghosts, the spirits of the dead. Of course there was no such things as ghosts. Ghosts were fake. She's gone to 'haunting' sites in and around New York. No Ghosts. It was fun to pretend though. That feeling you get when you fully shut your brain off and operate on pure emotion. That gentle chill running up your spine when the sounds of footsteps are in the distance and you jump to conclusions, it's gotta be a ghost. Give herself up to her primal fear.
But now? Fuck that. Fuck em. Scout could not give less of a shit.
A twig snapped in the distance. Either a ghost or a rodent. Whatever, fuck em. Fuck you ghost.
She threw a third rock at the grave marker. She must have threw too hard because that rock ricocheted off the face of the marker and caught Scout right in the forehead.
Scout cursed. She clutched her head, nearly losing her balance. She was smart enough to brace her elbow against the grave stone before that could happen. But, still, her forehead swelled like a sonofabitch.
"Fuck me."
Well that wasn't a good idea, now was it?