Halloween Haunts: The Pukwudgie
Halloween Haunts: The Pukwudgie
By Ricardo D. Rebelo
Bobby was in awe of the orange and green field. He looked forward to it every year. At thirteen he hadn’t seen many, but Bobby had savored every one.
He hated September because it meant school, which was always a low point for him. No more beaches, clam cakes, fresh waffle cones filled with coffee ice cream and long summer days.
Three weeks into the school year, Indian summer usually ran out of steam. The air would get crisp and his mom would start drinking pumpkin spice lattes like Dunkin Donuts was sponsoring her.
It was the best time.
The Silva’s lived in Freetown, Massachusetts, which is a beautiful rural Yankee country town. Thomas Kinkade would be hard pressed to find a better place for inspiration.
Bobby’s mom, Maria, had lived in their farmhouse her whole life. His grandfather Armindo had bought it when they moved here from Portugal in the 1960s. Their family grew corn, but kept a field of pumpkins every year as well. They also had goats and pigs.
Bobby had learned not to grow too close to the livestock. His grandfather would slaughter the animals when it came time, and the heartbreak was too much to take. Bobby’s mom always assured him it was the family’s way. Hard work, blood, and sacrifice is what he had been taught.
Things were not always that dark. Mostly, Bobby loved his life on the farm and loved Freetown especially. He hoped he could live there forever.
“Roberto, when you get a chance, go check on Orange Crush,” said Bobby’s mom.
His name was in fact Roberto, but he felt it was too Portuguese sounding, so he begged people to call him Bobby.
Orange Crush was the name that Bobby gave to the pumpkin they were putting in the FFA (Future Farmers of America) Competition. orange referred to its color and crush referred to its size.
His grandfather pooled together all of his old world farming knowledge to grow some of the biggest pumpkins in all of New England and Orange Crush was the biggest of them all.
The family had a goal to enter the Safeway World Championship Pumpkin Weigh-Off in Half-Moon Bay, California. To win, Orange Crush would have to tip the scales at 2749 lbs or more.
One of Bobby’s many tasks was making sure that Orange Crush was well fed and healthy. With a water hose behind him, Bobby walked through the pumpkin patch. Rows of orange and green minions sitting at the foot of a giant.
He had to water it twelve times a day. It had a thirst that could not be slaked. As of the last time they had checked, Orange Crush was 7 ft 5 in long and 6 ft 7 in wide, and could have produced at least 687 pies. That could fill a lot of Halloween and Thanksgiving tables.
Bobby had grown tired of the constant watering, though. It was a simple chore, but a chore. It was dusk and the sky only had a faint ribbon of orange sunshine left to fight against the night. Bobby was nodding off while holding the hose at his waist. The cold water hitting his feet shocked him back to consciousness. Once he was clear of brain fog, Bobby got a sense that something was looking at him.
Because they lived a stone’s throw from a forest, Bobby was accustomed to all sorts of animals, insects, and reptiles peeping at him working the fields but…this felt different.
“Hello?” he asked.
No reply.
“Hello?” He asked louder with an added teaspoon of concern.
“Don’t let it be a black bear,” he said under his breath.
Black bears had been doing a hell of a job re-populating southeastern New England and had been spotted in all the surrounding towns. His mom purchased a can of bear spray for him just in case, but it did Bobby no good sitting on his nightstand right now.
He then heard a rustling sound. Looking around, he could not peg the direction it came from. Another rustle and then a crack. The crack was distinct. It was the sound of a pumpkin splitting.
“Shit,” said Bobby.
A deep sound came next, a thump. He could feel it in the pit of his stomach. Bobby used it like sonar to point it at…Orange Crush.
It was wobbling now, ever so slightly. But how? How could the giant mass of tangerine colored uber gourd move? It did, though. Back and forth like an egg on the verge of hatching. It was like Humpty Dumpty, he thought.
“Please don’t have a great fall,” he said under his breath.
Bobby’s curiosity trumped his fears at the moment, and he stood, waiting to see what the outcome would be. Back and forth and side to side, it swayed. Bobby worried it would trample him.
A crack shot out from deep within. Bobby could now see a fissure beginning to form on the behemoth’s skin. This was not a bear or a groundhog. What the hell was it? Every muscle in his body was as taut as a cord now. It was time for fight or flight and grandpa Armindo did not raise a pussy.
When the explosion came, Bobby was as stoic as a little boy wrapped in a blanket of terror could be. He was immediately pelted with Orange Crush’s skin, which felt like slabs of slate. Then the guts of the beast came, covering him with seeds and slime. It was only when Bobby pulled away the pumpkin guts from his face did he see the ancient beast.
It was smaller than him. Perhaps only three feet tall. Covered in quills, which meant it had to be a porcupine, but its face was that of an old man. Bronze creased and cracked it looked at Bobby with its yellow eyes. It smiled. The type of smile Bobby gave when he opened a box to reveal the fresh pizza waiting inside. The smile of hunger that is about to be satiated.
During the summer, Bobby had attended some lectures given by the Wampanoag Indians who had a reservation five miles from his house. They talked about the folklore of Freetown. Part of that folklore included the story of a cryptid which inhabited these woods, the Pukwudgie.
Pukwudgies were ancient mischief makers who eventually became dangerous.
Bobby realized all of this in a moment while he was pissing his pants. He knew it was best to evacuate the area like his urine evacuated his bladder, fast and instinctual.
He stood, turned, and immediately tripped over a smaller pumpkin. Behind Bobby the Pukwudgie let out a wicked laugh. It gave him the second he needed to collect himself. He stood up again and ran. The Pukwudgie was on the chase.
Somehow, the beast found the time to pick up and throw some of the smaller gourds at Bobby. One hit him dead center of his back and he stumbled for a moment. It had to have been a combination of adrenaline and survival instinct that kept him upright. Bobby was now running in a serpentine pattern to dodge the incoming pumpkins. The Pukwudgie’s laughter now filled the early fall air like a cloud of mosquitoes biting Bobby. He reached down, grabbed a pumpkin of his own, turned, and fired it at the beast. It hit the dead center of its face. That had been the greatest throw of Bobby’s life, but alas, the Pukwudgie was undaunted. The beast let out a howl and continued the chase. Bobby turned back and continued to the farmhouse.
It was then he thought he would not make it. This was it. Bobby would spend eternity, or at the very least, this Halloween, in the belly of the ancient creature.
At that moment, his foot found the bucket he had left out when he washed his bike earlier. He had literally kicked the bucket.
He turned now, on the ground, ready to accept his fate. The beast stood over him and bared its teeth. They glinted in the early moonlight. The porcupine-like spines were now fully extended, giving the Pukwudgie an added terror that was overkill. It leaned over Bobby and was savoring the moment when its head exploded into a million pieces.
“MALDITO!” said grandpa Armindo.
Bobby knew what “Maldito” means in Portuguese. It meant, “Damn You!”
Grandpa Armindo now looked at him. Bobby was a collage of pumpkin and pukwudgie entrails. He was like a spirit board of filth.
Grandpa Armindo just shook his head at Bobby.
“Pukwudgie,” He said.
“Pukwudgie,” Boby replied.
Later that night, after a long shower, Bobby laid in bed and wondered how many times grandpa Armindo had confronted the Pukwudgies and how many more times he would have to fight them off in the battle to raise a prize pumpkin for Halloween.
Ricardo D. Rebelo has published multiple horror shorts for magazines and anthologies such as Halloweenthology & Flash of the Un-Dead, and Dead Girls Walking by Wicked Shadow Press, Monsters in the Mills, Monster Mag, The Chamber, and Scars. He also co-wrote the films Beyond the Dunwich Horror, Frankenstein in a Women’s Prison, and Lizbeth a Victorian Nightmare. Ricardo has also directed the award-winning PBS Documentaries Island of My Dreams, Dark New England, and Lizbeth, a Victorian Nightmare.
Ricardo D. Rebelo He/Him
ricdrebelo@gmail.com
Great story! This story reminds me of my childhood. I can’t tell you how many times I was frightened by the night air, or the dark corners of the basement while doing my nightly chores. But Thank goodness I never came upon a pukwudgie.