How’d it get so late?! OMG. Okay, enjoy my drive up the Peninsula at breakneck speed. But watch out for a 2008 Mercedes SL550…

I almost didn’t take the gig. I shouldn’t have, really. Last minute, hours from home, but this late in October catering gigs have largely dried up. I leave my bar bag and a change of clothes in the car just in case. When the scheduler called and told me where the gig was, I said no way – that’s too far. But she belied her desperation saying she’d pay double my normal rate and throw in an extra fifty to cover gas.

Everyone has their price, and honestly, she blew past it.

It was the holiday party for a startup down in Portola Valley. Full bar. They’d set it up so by the time I got there I could walk in and start serving. Sounded good. Too good.

The run down through SF was uneventful and fast, and even the start-stop down 19^th Avenue felt particularly spritely, like luck was somehow hastening the way for me and Dawn, The Gray Ghost ­– my trusty Toyota Matrix.

The afternoon traffic that chokes the approach into Santa Clara Valley hadn’t backed up 280 far enough to affect my run down the peninsula, though I could see the red brake lights slowing to a stop just as I exited Alpine Road. Found the parking lot on the first pass and slotted Dawn next to one of the now-empty catering trucks in the back of the lot.

“You made great time,” Wendy, the event manager, said as I came through the door. “You’re in here.” She led me through our back-work area into an enormous airy cafeteria.

“This place is massive,” I said looking at the ferns around the towering windows.

“Right?” Wendy said. “Here we go. I had Eddie and Juanita set everything up, but it’s good you’ve got time to get everything settled.”

“When are we live?”

“Twenty minutes.”

“Perfect.” And it was. I’m pretty adaptable and I’ve worked with Juanita before. Set out my bar tools and readied for the crowd.

Let’s pause a moment, because it’s worth reviewing just how ridiculous this had been so far. Being over-paid for a cake-walk bar gig? Check. Smooth sailing through an afternoon commute from Sonoma down to Santa Clara County? Check. Everything from glassware to alcohol to mixers set up for me to just step in? Stupid good luck, right?

Even the young employees who rushed the bar first couldn’t dim my smile. I poured so many vodka sodas I lost count. There was the guy I had to card to make sure he was old enough to order a Long Island iced tea – a drink I find so irritating that it usually brings me down that I’m perpetuating its monstrosity. Not tonight.

With the first wave generously satiated and moved on to the various food stations set up, some of the older, more social employees came through. A fifty-something woman and I bonded over the simple pleasures of a Negroni. I introduced a bearded man to the alchemic miracle that is adding a few dashes of bitters to an otherwise pedestrian Mexican mule. One of the trio of sales guys (you could just tell they were sales guys) declared the Old Fashioned I made him “The best ever, bro!” and high fived me.

Dance music started at the other end of the cafeteria and the majority of the group relocated to that end.

“Not your scene?” I asked the older gentleman who came up to the bar after shaking his head at the dance floor.

He smiled at me, “Not for a long time.”

“What can I get you?”

“Manhattan?”

“With Makers?” I held up the half-full bottle of Makers Mark.

“Perfect,” he nodded. I added the Bourbon, sweet vermouth, and a few dashes of bitters to my mixing tin, stirred until the tin frosted on the outside and poured the chilled mixture into the waiting rocks glass. As I dropped a speared cherry into the rocks glass he nodded again, “Luxardo cherries? Improving on perfect, I like that.”

“Thank you, sir,” I said sliding the glass across the bar.

“Jack,” he said extending his right hand as he took the glass with his left.

“Jordy,” I said shaking his hand.

He took a sip. “Mmm, damn fine.”

“Thank you again,” I said.

“Do you live around here, Jordy?”

“Not for a long time.”

“But you’re from here?”

“Grew up in Mountain View.”

“And now you live…?”

“North bay. Guerneville.”

“Oh,” he said with a smile. “I love it up there.” He sipped his drink and lingered which was fine because my bar was all but abandoned. “How is it coming back down here?” he asked.

“Honestly?” he nodded. “It makes me melancholy.”

“Oh?”

“I know I could never afford to live in the town where I grew up. Something doesn’t seem right about that.”

He furrowed his brow in thought. “I was born in Manhattan. I guess I could live there again. Hell, who am I kidding? Of course I could live there.”

A younger employee came back for a refill of his vodka soda. “Sir,” he said deferentially to Jack before taking his drink and hurrying off.

“Are you staying down here after this?”

“No, I’m driving back north.”

“That’s a bit of a haul.”

“It’s a pretty drive – even in the dark. I know the route well.”

“Be careful – 280 is haunted these days.”

“Is it?”

“You haven’t heard about the Headless Hedge Fund Manager?”

I suppressed a laugh because I couldn’t tell whether he was serious or not. He must have noticed my stifled reaction.

“I’m dead serious,” he said soberly.

“Jack! Good to see you made it!” another older man came over and shook Jack’s hand. Then, to me, “You have Johnny Walker?”

“Black,” I nodded.

He smiled and held three fingers horizontally, “On the rocks.”

“Desmond,” Jack said. “Glad to be here. Say, I was just telling our friend, Jordy, here about the Headless Hedge Fund Manager that roams 280.”

I was expecting a knowing smile or a wink from Desmond. I didn’t expect the color to drain from his face. “Wait, you’re driving home tonight?” he said to me seriously.

“I am.”

Desmond took a big sip of his drink. “Son, you really want to rethink that.”

“Don’t really have a choice,” I said shrugging. “I’ll be fine.”

“Mary!” Desmond called to a woman in a perfectly tailored pantsuit.

“Desmond, good to see you. Jack, always a pleasure.” Then to me, “Greyhound?”

I nodded and started mixing.

“Mary, the bartender– “

“Jordy,” Jack corrected.

“Our bartender, Jordy, is intending to drive home tonight. North. On 280.”

Her eyes widened. “No, no, no,” she said. “Hedge Fund Harry is out there. No,” she said, “You can stay in cottage behind my house tonight – it’s just a few miles up Alpine.”

“Thank you, that’s really generous,” I said. “But I’ll be fine. I mean, it’s not like I’m going north alone – we all have to head north.”

“Did they carpool?”

“Uh, probably,” I said.

All three nodded sagely. “Harry picks off lone drivers,” Desmond said.

“Son, what kind of car do you drive?” Jack asked.

“Toyota Matrix.”

“Oh lord,” Mary said, crossing herself.

“She’s a great car!”

“Solo driver? Not a German car? Please reconsider Mary’s offer,” Desmond said.

“What is the deal with this Harry guy?”

The three looked at one another. Finally, Jack started. “They say he was a hedge fund manager, but I think he was a VC – most people encounter him around Sand Hill Road, so that would make more sense. They say he lost everything when Bear Stearns went belly up in 2008. Drove his Mercedes SL out on 280 doing over 100 with the top down. Didn’t look, didn’t think, Maybe he lost control, but he slid that convertible under a flatbed semi.” Jack drew his hand across his throat. “They never found the head, they say.”

“Now he prowls 280 searching for victims,” Desmond added. “No one takes 280 alone at night anymore…”

“I heard the CHP blocks off the northbound onramp from Sand Hill,” Mary said.

“They’d be smart if they did,” Desmond agreed.

“Aaaaaaand let’s hear from the man who made this party happen!” the DJ announced. “Where’s Jack Taylor?!”

“I guess that’s my cue,” Jack said, and the other two walked him down to give a speech.

“What was that about?” Wendy asked coming up next to me.

“Some crazy about a ghost in a Mercedes who haunts 280,” I said.

“Oh, the Headless Hedge Fund guy?”

“Not you, too?”

“No,” she laughed. “One of the guests warned me about him. Calmed down when I told him I rode down here in the truck.”

“Huh. Weird,” I said.

“You good here?” she asked.

“Yeah. Maybe some more ice. Otherwise I’m good.”

“Okay, I’ll send Charlie back,” and she left.

The rest of the night went just as smoothly, only with less talk of supernatural derivatives traders. The DJ shut the music off and the overhead lights in the cafeteria came on and I shifted into breaking down my bar. I set the last of the leftover liquor on a shelf in the kitchen and Jack came around the corner.

“Reconsidered Mary’s offer?

“I really need to get home.”

“Alright,” he said with a sigh. “Be careful.”

I helped the staff load the truck and then I was alone in the parking lot. The shuttle had left followed by the equipment truck.

“Ready, Dawn?” I asked as I turned the engine over. I took in a deep breath and told myself it was just a bunch of rich executives messing with the bartender. I blew out the breath, shifted into reverse, and then first and turned onto Alpine for 280.

I’ll give it to them, going northbound on 280 there was no one on the road – literally no one. The moon hung heavy over the rolling foothills of the Santa Cruz mountains as the road crested a hill. The long bone white Stanford Linear Accelerator ran perpendicular under the freeway and I saw the sign for Sand Hill Road ahead. I passed the exit and Sand Hill Road overpass flashed by above me. I passed the on-ramp that feeds onto the freeway. Nothing.

I breathed a sigh of relief that no one – or no thing – had gotten on from Sand Hill Road. I saw the sign for “Woodside Town Limit” and I figured I was safe.

Then I saw a pair of headlights behind me.

At first, they didn’t even register – a pair of headlights in your rearview mirror on the freeway? Nothing uncommon about that. But as I cruised along at 70 I could see the headlights gaining on me at an alarming pace.

Growing up there was a persistent rumor that the same people who developed the Autobahn in Germany developed 280 with its wide lanes and gentle curves. And, like the Autobahn, 280 was rated to speeds well in excess of 100 mph. I don’t think there’s any merit to those stories, but that doesn’t stop kids from coming out to this stretch and opening up their cars to see what they can do.

From the speed the lights were gaining on me going 70, that’s what looked like was happening behind me. But the lights were… off. Then it registered: the piercing blue glow of late 00’s HID headlights.

“It’s him,” I said aloud. I downshifted to fifth and stomped the accelerator. I blew past the Woodside exit doing 90 and the car was gaining. As I passed the Farm Hill exit, I watched in the rearview as the approaching car flashed under the streetlights. Silver. And the three pointed star emblem on the grill.

The speedometer flirted with 100 mph as the Mercedes came along side me. I turned briefly to look and saw the top was down and the driver piloting the car had no head. The neck just ended.

We were abreast with Crystal Springs reservoir And the Headless Hedge Fund Manager and I were traveling at breakneck speeds. The drop down towards the highway 92 interchange pushed our speed over 100 and suddenly I heard something bouncing off the car. I looked up and saw the old laptops he was flinging at me. A Flip camera bounced off my windshield. An “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” DVD shattered on my driver’s side window. I waited until the last moment and then I jerked the steering wheel right and cut across the shoulder onto the offramp for 92 East. I looked over my shoulder to see Harry The Headless still going on 280. Breathing a sigh of relief, I exited onto Polhemus Road, then took the onramp for 92 West and then merged back onto 280. Passing San Andreas Lake on my left, I started to relax and I let the car slow to a safe speed as other cars joined onto the freeway finally. By the time the airport traffic from 380 merged, I knew I was safe.

The road rolled up and through Daly City when a pair of blue headlights merged on from Westborough Blvd and cut off three people gunning hard for the fast lane where I was. “Couldn’t be…” I thought as the lights closed on me, whipped hard into the lane next to me and then came aside. The Headless Hedge Fund Manager steered with one hand while the other held the decapitated head, its eyes glowing red, its mouth open and cackling.

I dropped the car back into fifth, and floored it while steering into the emergency lane to pass the car in front of me. Their honks barely registered as I weaved back into the lane. The Mercedes was similarly weaving in and out of traffic keeping pace. We dropped down into where highway 1 comes in and the freeway widens, and now it was a game of keeping a car between us as we weaved laterally across all lanes of traffic. At one point he got a clear shot at me and my passenger side window exploded as a netbook crashed into my car. I picked it up with a napkin and threw the foul thing back out the window.

The light from 280 onto 19^th was yellow as I screeched around it doing fifty. The Mercedes, likewise skittered around the turn. I weaved through slow traffic along Stonestown Galleria, at one point cutting the Hedge Fund Manager behind a parked bus. But my victory was short lived as he screeched out and let the big V8 power him up the hill past Sloat and Taraval.

Reader, I have admitted excess speed already. I have admitted using the emergency lane, cutting people off, and even littering not-quite-laptops. But the number of red lights I blew through on 19^th Avenue would make the most hardened criminal blush. I barely dodged a woman pushing a pram who – rightfully – flipped me off. I stomped the brake to time a fast pass across Lincoln Blvd.

The Headless Hedge Fund Manager came up aside me again as we ripped around the corner of Park Presidio. He knew where I was headed now, and he wanted my soul. An old Dell laptop dented my hood. A flurry of iPods and original white iPhones came crashing through shattered passenger side window. Straightening down Park Presidio Blvd, the race was on. He had the power, the speed, and the lifelessness to take all the chances he wanted passing cars and running lights. I had to live long enough to get away, but I also knew if I slowed even the least bit he’d doubtless fire a “Wall-e” DVD through the passenger window like a ninja star and slit my throat.

We blasted up and through the MacArthur tunnel with Dawn just barely edging ahead of the silver Mercedes from sheer force of will. Then the freeway drops and turns under the Presidio Parkway and I dropped down into third. He shot past me into the tight left that brought us up onto the approach to the Golden Gate Bridge. He swerved left to block my path, but I floored the gas and slipped by his right side onto the approach to the bridge. He corrected and screeched after me gaining and gaining and then his headlights stopped.

I was over the water and he couldn’t cross.

I drove slowly across the bridge and stopped at the rest stop on the opposite side and stared at the San Francisco side. Was he still there? Did he turn around to hunt someone else on 280? I wasn’t going to find out.

The scheduler called a week later and asked if I’d be interested – at triple pay – for an emergency job on the Peninsula again. I hung up.

Fern patiently listens to me read these stories her. It’s a chance for me to find my typos (well, some of them anyway) and to get her feedback. For this, the closing half of the story I started a lot longer ago than I anticipated, she had some great points about where I could add detail. And I agreed with everything she said. But, look, it’s 11:30pm. I worked a long bar shift last night, and while I did sleep in this morning, I also changed the front brakes and roters on my car, so I’m a little tired – especially knowing my alarm will go off at 4:45. I’m not adding any more. But I do have a conclusion to the Ouija board story. If you haven’t read that first part, it’s here. Okay, here’s part 2.

“I think you’re going to love it,” Hector said, leading Terry through the tall aisles of drying slabs.

“I have no doubt.”

“It’s been a while, yeah?”

“Good things come to those who wait, right?”

“That’s my business, man,” Hector beamed. They came to the end of an aisle and Hector put his hand on a beautiful slab of dark brown and black striations nearly six feet across and twelve feet long. When I had seen it shortly after being milled it looked amazing. Now, though, that impression seemed muted; time had been kind to this milled slab. If only I could say the same for Sarah and her memories.

Once I got the slab back to my workshop I laid it on my work table and sat on a stool and stared at it for an hour. It’s stupid, but it felt alive. I know that’s just the story of Sarah’s son who killed himself on this tree playing into my imagination, but…

After being inside my cool workshop for nine hours the wood still felt warm like noon on an Indian summer day.

My imagination.

Nonetheless, I made a promise. I started on the short end of the slab. Cut down, I ran the wood through my planer until I reduced it to the thickness I wanted, then through the jointer. Then the real work began.

After I made that first Ouiji board to show Sarah it kind of became a Halloween signature at my gallery, so I’ve had a fair amount of practice transforming exotic hardwoods into Ouija boards, but even by my improving standards this example turned out really special. It seemed to gleam from within. I milled the planchette out of the same walnut and set a round glass piece into it to highlight the selected character.

When I showed it to Sarah she beamed. “It’s stunning,” she said, her eyes glassing over with emotion. I worried that after waiting so long she might be underwhelmed, but I was clearly wrong. Once she wiped the initial tears away I could see her staring at the board with something more…

“I made you something else from that wood,” I said.

“Terry? Really?”

“Well, I noticed that wall,” I nodded to an empty wall at the end of the living room, “looked a little bare.” I opened the front door and nodded to my guys who wheeled in a matching walnut credenza. Sarah gasped.

“Terry, you shouldn’t have!” she stared, a huge smile on her face.

I picked the Ouija board off the table, slotted the planchette into the space I carved on the bottom for it, then opened the two doors of the credenza to reveal empty shelves, the topmost just big enough to slide the Ouija board into. “You had to have somewhere to keep it,” I said, and closed the cabinet.

“Come here so I can hug you!” Sarah insisted.

We agreed to try out the board the next night, October 15^th.

When I knocked on the door, Sarah’s daughter, Jenny, let me in. “My mom told me what you guys were up to,” she said without smiling. “For the record, I don’t approve. The cabinet is gorgeous, though. You do amazing work.”

Taking the compliment and the censure juxtaposed so closely together left me blinking a moment.

After a moment, Jenny smiled and said, “My mom’s in the living room. She’s lit candles,” she led me inside. “Let me ask, are you guys like twelve?”

“Are you going to make us popcorn tonight?”

She smiled, “I do not want you two keeping me up all night!”

“Don’t worry,” I said, “I was going to take your mom out later in the wheel chair and we were going to TP the Peterson’s place.”

“I knew it!” We both laughed.

“Terry!” Sarah said as I came into the room. I bent down for her for a hug and a kiss on the cheek before I sat across the table, the board between us. The planchette sad innocuous on the polished brown surface. “Are you ready?” she said, a little spark in her eyes.

I nodded.

“I’ll leave you two kids to yourselves,” Jenny said. “Shall I get the lights?”

“Please, Jenny. Thank you!”

Jenny hit the lights and the flickering candles made the striations in the wood seem to dance and pulse.

“If you need me, I’ll be in my room watching TV. I have a proton pack in case things get out of hand,” she left and Sarah and I sat silent for some time just staring at the board.

“Well, let’s see what happens…” She put one of her hands on a corner of the planchette and I put one of mine on the opposite end…

Look, I’ve read a lot about Ouija boards. When the planchette moves it’s usually someone actively directing it. When it’s not, there’s theories that it’s the participants’ unconscious’s causing it to move. I’d read about an experiment where a group made up a character with a whole back story, then later with a Ouija board contacted him and he unsurprisingly confirmed their details and added new ones. So, when I saw the neighbors playing with the Ouija board at the neighborhood Halloween party three years ago, I brushed it off entirely. But in the three years of taking care of this wood and getting to know Sarah and her history…

The planchette positively flew around the board. I know I wasn’t actively moving it. I’d accuse Sarah of moving it, but like me she barely had three fingers on the edge – sure, maybe she pushed, but I could see she just didn’t have the physical ability to pull the planchette without upending it. And it coursed across the board from letter to letter before we even had a chance to ask a question. With my right fingers on the planchette, I had my left hand free to write down what the board dictated.

“H-E-L-L-O, it spelled hello!” Sarah said and then gasped. “M-o-m.” She snatched her fingers off the planchette which immediately died. “Terry, if that’s you moving it…” I could see sadness and anger in her accusation.

“Sarah, no, I wouldn’t ever do something like that!” I held up my hands defensively.

She stared at me long and hard before she appeared to make up her mind and placed her hand back on the planchette, as did I. The heart-shaped planchette started dancing immediately. “d-o-n-t-b-e-a-f-r-a-i-d-m-o-m.”

“To late for that,” she muttered under her breath. “Who is this?” she asked coldly.

“Y-o-u-k-n-o-w.”

“Say your name,” she demanded.

“J-o-e-y.”

This time I took my hand off the planchette, killing its momentum. “Sarah, you know if there is something communicating with us, it might not be… It could be an entity trying to trick you, pretending to be who you want it to be.”

She nodded. We both placed our hands on the board. “If you are really who you say you are, prove it. Tell me something only he would know.”

The planchette darted around the board. “I-c-e-c-r-e-a-m-s-t-a-i-n-o-n-r-u-g-b-y-b-e-d”

Sarah gasped and pulled her hand back. “Joey spilled strawberry ice cream on the floor by his bed,” she nodded to the second floor. “Stain is still up there on the carpet.”

I arched an eyebrow and we put our hands back on the planchette. “I-m-i-s-s-y-o-u-m-o-m” it spelled.

“I miss you too, Joey,” she replied. She started to ask another question but before the sound came out of her mouth the planchette started moving. “I-m-s-o-r-r-y-m-o-m-i-w-a-s-h-u-r-t-i-n-g.”

“I know you were hurting, Joey,” she replied, then added, “Well, I know now. You didn’t tell us. You didn’t let us in.”

“C-o-u-l-d-n-t-m-o-m-t-o-o-s-a-d”

“Yeah, well, you broke my heart,” her voice cracked as she spoke. Tears ran unabated down her cheeks.

“S-o-r-r-y-d-a-d-i-s-h-e-r-e-n-o-w-n-o-t-l-o-n-e-l-y.”

“You tell him I miss him. And I love him.”

“H-e-s-a-y-s-h-e-k-n-o-w-s-m-o-u-s-e-k-i-n.”

“Mousekin,” she said pulling hand back and covering her face with both hands. “That was Roger’s name for me.”

“Look, Sarah, we don’t have to go on–“

“Let’s go,” she said.

I picked up the pencil and placed my right fingers on the planchette.

“A-r-e-y-o-u-c-o-m-i-n-g-s-o-o-n-m-o-m”

“No, honey, I’ve still got some living to do. And your sister, too. We’ve been spending time together.”

“I-k-n-o-w-w-e-m-i-s-s-h-e-r-t-o-o-y-o-u-b-o-t-h-c-a-n-c-o-m-e.”

“Honey, no. Jenny’s got a husband now. They’re talking about kids.”

“W-e-m-i-s-s-y-o-u” it repeated. And then, “A-r-e-y-o-u-c-o-m-i-n-g-s-o-o-n-m-o-m.”

“It just asked that,” I said.

“I know,” Sarah said nervously.

“Y-o-u-b-o-t-h-n-e-e-d-t-o-c-o-m-e-t-o-u-s” and then again, “W-e-m-i-s-s-y-o-u.” Then “C-o-m-e-s-o-o-n.”

“We’re done,” Sarah took her hand off the planchette and I pulled my hand off as well.

The planchette slid of its own accord smoothly across the board to the upper right where the word “No” shone through the window of the planchette.

“Put it away, Terry,” Sara said, fear evident. “Please.”

I nodded and picked up the planchette quickly, lest it move somewhere on its own again. I stowed it on the underside of the board. I opened both doors of the credenza, placed the Ouija board onto its shallow shelf and closed the credenza again. I turned around and started to say, “Sarah” but behind me the doors of the credenza flew open wide and the Ouija board rattled angrily on its shelf.

Sarah blew out the candles, plunging the room into darkness. The rattling of the board stopped. The room felt expectantly quiet. In the dark I turned around and felt for the doors of the credenza and closed them.

“Is everyone okay?” Jenny said, flipping the light switch on. “The whole house was shaking. Was that an earthquake?”

“I don’t think so,” Sarah said sadly.

“I’m, uh, I’m going to head out for the night.” I didn’t know what to say to Sarah, so I just said, “Good night,” and hurriedly saw myself out, the cold autumn air a welcome shock.

I woke to the sirens before I saw the orange glow through the curtain. By the time I got to the front door, Sarah’s house roared fully engulfed in raging fire. The first two fire trucks were rolling up and I looked around the yard and didn’t see Sarah or Jenny. I ran towards the front door I had just left hours earlier. The knob seared the skin on my hand. I kicked it in, but tongues of flame blew outward knocking me backwards. A fireman grabbed me and started pulling me away from the burning structure.

“There’s people in there!” I yelled. “An old woman, Sarah, and her daughter, Jenny.”

“We’ll do what we can, sir. Stay back.”

But there was nothing they could do except keep the fire from spreading to my house and the Peterson’s on the other side. They managed to get the blaze under control just after dawn. Once everything cooled down, investigators found Jenny’s body with Sarah’s. Smoke inhalation, they said, got them in all likelihood before the fire did. Arson investigators sorted through the ashes and traced the ignition point to the living room, where the credenza once stood. In the ashes, they found the Ouija board dirtied but unmarred from the flames.