The old water tower stood out like a forgotten relic, casting an oblong shadow across the weedy plain. Its rusted tin aged as the years flowed by, and the water tower no longer served its original purpose to the town that lay close by. There, plastered across the large tank at the top, a name sprawled in white paint. In its original days, the lettering would have been in block letters, serving as a title to the town: "LEWTON." But now, its faded and twisted joinery blends across the battered tank, having endured too many years of weather.
Out of commission, the 40-meter structure could no longer keep the water pressure, but its bones live on in the community as the piping stretches below the surface like an old oak tree's roots, extending far beyond its radius, unseen. Its cylindrical body creaks in the wind, and its triangular roof, acting as a head to the structure, is now as useful as a holey tent on a stormy day. The rusty rungs on the ladder stretching from the earth's soil to the bottom of the roofing structure are mostly intact, minus a few rungs that have been destroyed. Weeds attempt to slither up the steel scaffolding legs, reaching for the sun, but they fail to race to the top. The huge tower now stands on a slight lean, as if the earth has shifted slightly and wrinkled like aging skin. The wind makes a distinct low howl through the holes in the structure, as if wanting to speak to anyone who would listen. The stories this tower could tell, if you could translate the windy shrieks.
They would speak of James Barringer and his immaculate, greasy slicked-back hair. A teenager built like an adult, wearing his blue Levi jeans, Lewton's school bully frequently skipped school so he could sit at the base of the ladder and smoke his pack of Lucky Strikes. He would lean on the scaffolding and slick his old black Genuine Ace Hard Rubber Comb through his hair, thinking to himself how he would like to take Jenny Cartwright here and get lucky someday. He knew she would want that, as she always wore that blue dress that was a size too short for her. That's right, he thought, a girl would only wear that if she wanted someone to notice her. James Barringer did notice her, alright. He smiled to himself, his off-white teeth already starting to yellow from the cigarette's nicotine. James kept his clothes as pristine as his hair, and his white bleached T-shirt showed off his muscular build. His arms were slightly bruised around the forearms from a previous encounter with Hurricane Henry.
James Barringer did anything but go home, knowing his own father, Henry, would regularly serve him a beating. It used to be an irregular occurrence when his mother, Ireen, would run interference with Henry. Now that his mother was gone, it seemed Henry only had his booze as a distraction, and that usually only delayed the beating. James’ constant flashbacks of why the beating occurred used to be easier. He would recollect that most of the time, they were things he did that would trigger his old man to snap, like the time he accidentally slid his father's leather wallet into the side of the couch, or when he left his glass of water on the kitchen sink half full, rather than pouring it into the drain. These would set off fireworks behind Henry's eyes, and no matter which room James was hiding in, he could hear his father's dirty boots stomping furiously on the wooden floorboards, hunting to find him. Recently, however, James wasn't sure what he did to trigger Henry's rage. It seemed like his attitude would change as quickly as the wind, and with that came the nickname James had aptly given him: Hurricane Henry. Of course, this was a secret nickname that only James would ever know, as he would never talk about it to anyone, which was so fitting as the kids at Lewton High would end up giving James a similar nickname in the years to come.
Old James ‘Bruiser’ Barringer leaned against the scaffolding and imagined a simpler life. He thought of sports as he inhaled the cigarette smoke through the brown filter at the base of the smoke, causing small, dizzying head spins that made him feel like he was in a dream—not the dreams where you knew you were dreaming, but the real ones you normally only got when you were sick with the flu. James Barringer liked this feeling; it made him feel away from things, "checked out," as he liked to call it. He dreamed of the smell of his mother's lemon cake, so distant a smell he could hardly describe it. He dreamed of the sound a baseball made when it knocked against the steel bat after clocking a home run. He dreamed of cars and the sound their rubber tires made when the car swung wide around a corner. And then, he dreamed of Jenny Cartwright's short blue dress. It seemed all his dreams would circle back to Jenny in her little blue skirt. Her hair was a dirty blonde, with slight curls at the bottom, almost waving to onlookers. She hadn't shown much interest in boys yet, as it seemed her focus was on her schooling, but the way she walked past James when he was at his locker—he knew she was putting on a show. A single modeling walkway parade just for James.
James Barringer put out the end of his cigarette on the steel scaffolding, leaving a small circular black mark, before he flicked the cigarette down with the scattered remains of the rest of the packet. If only James Barringer had known what was to come, he could have projected his life in a different trajectory. "If only" are two words that wish someone had invented a time machine to take them away. If only he had left Hurricane Henry's wallet on the side table, if only he had poured out his water and put away his glass. Two words that would repeat over and over in his head in his later years. If only he had known that stop meant stop. That the screams of Jenny Cartwright weren't in ecstasy, but in pain and fear. That Jenny would climb this very ladder that he stood near now, trying to flee from James 'Bruiser' Barringer. The blood on Jenny’s hands made the ladder slippery to grip, and her escape route almost impossible. How James's rage overtook him when he realized he couldn't run away from what he had done. The fireworks in his eyes were only put out by the tears that swelled in them, knowing that he had become his father.
His father's voice welcomed him as he entered the state penitentiary in Oakbank. “Welcome, son.” James Barringer would hear a howling gust echoing in his ears, just like the howling he used to hear under the big old Lewton water tower when he was younger. A whistling low pitch, like the one you would make before telling someone a secret. Lewton was a town that held many secrets, and a lot of them involved this very water tower. More stories are spilling out through the cracks and holes than water these days.
Like the story of Henry Winters and his school friends Mark O’Hare and Troy Cassiday, unforgettable childhood friends who would play a game of racing up the misty tower because Troy received a retro time-precision stopwatch for Christmas, and Mark O'Hare bet a comic book he could beat Henry Winters in a race to the top and back.
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“Well, we can't exactly race as there is only one ladder,” Henry Winters pointed his bony finger at the rusted ladder that leaned crookedly at the top of the structure.
“Yeah, I know, you fart face,” replied Mark O’Hare, smirking, his chipped front tooth from an accident involving his bike and the bumpy pavement outside Lewton's library.
“One at a time, up and back, and we will use ‘Squirt’s’ stopwatch,” Mark O’Hare spat. Squirt was Troy Cassiday’s nickname due to his height, and although he was small as a boy, the nickname still sticks to this day, even though he is the tallest in his friend group. Back then, Troy Cassiday was a good 15 centimeters shorter than his friends, and they would use any height joke they could to get a rise out of him. Troy Cassiday, who was well-used to it by now, would sometimes play along with the jokes, and the boys would find it funny, as the jokes were all in good fun.
Troy pulled out the, until now, useless present he got from his younger brother Jim, who admired Troy so much that Troy took the stopwatch everywhere with him, to prove the present was worthy. The black Casio stopwatch protruded two black cylinder buttons at the top for precision timekeeping, and on the back was a very messy six-year-old's handwriting on old yellowish masking tape, which clearly his mother had helped him write out. "Time with you is the best – love Jimmy." It made Troy momentarily laugh at how corny and sweet the idea was.
“Oh, I get it, but you think that ladder’s gonna hold?” Henry Winters pointed out what he and Troy were thinking.
“Of course it’ll hold! Just look at it!” Mark snapped back. “I heard that Katey climbs up to the top to make out with Greg Harrison.”
Henry's face moved to a stunned expression as the same finger he used to point to the top now adjusted his black Vision-era glasses. “Greg Harrison? What a jerk,” he started. “I'm not even sure what Jenny Quill sees in him,” Henry said, shrugging his shoulders way too high to his cheeks.
“Jenny Quill probably sees the school captain,” Troy Cassiday replied, stating the way-too-obvious. It was clear to the others that Henry liked Jenny, and because they were next-door neighbors on Fenton Street, Henry thought it was obvious that as they got older, they would clearly marry and have kids together. “I think he also got the Lewton High academic achievement award last year,” Troy added, completely forgetting about the unsafety of the ladder.
“You wanna go first, or should I?” Mark O’Hare's fearlessness was now pointed out to his friends. Hell, even with his chipped tooth, the boys remembered Mark making jumps out front of the library on his banged-up Speedster bike the following day. He was a daredevil and could be found on his weekends climbing trees and throwing water balloons at passersby.
“Um, you can,” Henry Winters stated, remembering the feel of the water balloon popping on his head that very day. Troy Cassiday scraped the heel of his shoe in the dirt about 10 meters from the water tower, forming a not-so-straight line.
“Here is the start and finish line,” Troy said excitedly as adrenaline now took over. “You need to touch the roof with your hand before coming back.” Troy looked at the height of the tower with a grin, knowing he was simply just the timekeeper—the safest place to be to enjoy the show. “You're not racing, Squirt?” Henry questioned Troy, but before Troy could answer, Mark ruffled up Henry’s hair and lifted a hand above Troy’s head.
“Of course, he’s not,” Mark laughed. “You gotta be this tall to ride, buddy!” He chuckled at the expense of Troy, who didn’t even care, as the joke got him out of competing in a race against the others. Troy clicked the stopwatch alive and looked up at Mark, who was now in a frozen racing position at the start line. “C’mon, say it, Squirt!” Mark O’Hare grunted, focusing on the task at hand.
“Go!” Troy screamed in a loud voice as he hit the low-quality black button on the top of the stopwatch, making the numbers start to count. Mark O’Hare burst to life, his legs stretching to cover as much ground as possible.
“Whoa, man! Look at him go!” Henry whispered at the sheer speed of Mark O’Hare’s grubby white Blaze track sneakers, almost pedaling the earth as they thumped down hard. He made it to the base of the ladder in just over five seconds flat, only momentarily losing a second as he found his grip on the steel rungs of the ladder and commenced his climb. “I can’t beat him,” Henry Winters stated, shaking his head so hard that his glasses wobbled with momentum.
The two boys watched as Mark climbed further and further up the ladder. Faster and faster, his grubby fingers moved onto the next rung and then the next, causing the sound of a metallic chime with each new bar he grabbed. It wasn’t long before he was about 10 meters high when one of the bars bent and gave way under Mark’s hand. Then everything happened in slow motion. Rather than projecting his momentum upwards, the loose bar collapsing caused Mark to lean backward slightly and almost climb outwards at a diagonal for a split second before his hands failed to catch the next rung. Both Henry Winters and Troy Cassiday could do nothing but watch their friend Mark O’Hare fall from the tower. His scream on the way down still haunted them both. When he landed with a thud on the ground, Troy swore he felt the earth shake. Before realizing what to do, and just because his thumb was nervously on the stop button, Troy clicked his Casio stopwatch, and the time froze. It took only 58 seconds for Mark O’Hare to lose his life that day.
Both Henry and Troy still remain friends, but they have never returned to that spot. Dozens of kids risk their lives challenging each other to climb to the top of the water tower still to this day, and even the fences around the area sectioning Lewton’s old relic off don’t stop the teenagers from jumping the fence to hang out in the area. If anything, the fence encourages it. “Henry’s scream,” as the kids call the windy howling noise through the water tower, still can be heard echoing off the metal container.
There are many stories through the years that take place near, on, or around Lewton’s old water tower. Some say that the tower itself is haunted and acts like a hopeless beacon for those that are damned. The sounds of creaking steel at night carry for miles across the open plain. Jenny’s and Henry’s screams are only a few tales that this water tower tells. Older residents of Lewton say that they should rip it out, as it’s like a plague to the town, but they have been around long enough to hear the ghastly tales and know of the history of the water tower. As time fades in and out and the memories act like ripples in the ocean, only sometimes resurfacing to cause those that lived through it pain again. This is not the last story the water tower will tell. No, not even close. If you are quiet at night, you will hear the hissing of the wind through the gaps in its cylindrical hollow body, as if the water tower is telling all those around it to sssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhh and listen, because it knows of another secret in Lewton, far worse than any history book you could find in Lewton's Library could tell.