Dark and Twisty

To walk through the streets of Salem at night was to walk with the legends. Four hundred years of lies and stories alike, told for the sake of entertainment - despite the town knowing better. The Salem Witch Trials had very little to do with actual witchcraft, and everything to do with politics.

But Politics don't sell museum tickets.

The quaint tourist town of Salem made a decision long ago to allow it's dark past to shape it's future, and luckily for them, it worked. Thanks in large part to the fact that walking through the streets of Salem in the sunlight was a much different experience. At night, the town was what stories were made of, and in the daylight - it was just another New England community.

November First was an undeclared clean up day. The tourists had all gone home, the streets had emptied, and the town was ready for it's yearly transition from witch town to hometown. Leaves fell and were raked, children passed around gathered candy at school, parents did their shopping and washing, and life went on.

But when night fell and the legends had died down simply because the locals had grown tired of repeating them, Salem still breathed with an eery calm; a darkness lingering in the shadows, threatening to consume anyone who didn't know better.

Vada Henley had that in common with her hometown.

At night, she was an enigma wrapped in a sad conundrum, trailing smoke behind her and leaving everything to the imagination. A darkness emanated off her, an eery acceptance of her own past, present, and future. Many people weren't at all prepared for the depth of strange and unhappy that came with encountering Vada Henley after sunset, so she kept to herself except to run her towns radio station. Working the graveyard shift, she sat alone in an octagon shaped room for eight hours where she was paid to be weird. Paid to say the things her twisted mind was thinking, all for the sake of entertainment.

When the sun rose, if Vada remained still awake (which she often did, because sleep was something that had become more of a task than her actual job), she was a different person. She allowed herself to blend into her surroundings (save for the shocking blue hair that always turned a few heads). She did her best to appear as anormal member of society, functioning even.

On Mondays, she brought her three favorites jackets into town to have them professionally cleaned. On Tuesdays, she hand delivered the checks for her electric and water bills to the post office, where she would have a short chat with the service lady about how much Salem has changed since the 90s (Vada keeps up with the conversation, but has few examples - she was merely six when the 90s ended). On Fridays, she traveled into Boston to attend a voluntary therapy session.

Every day at 6:45 AM, no matter her productive plans for the day, Vada left her house with nothing but a five dollar bill and her keys and trekked across town to the Jaho Coffee Shop. She ordered a cinnamon latte with low fat milk (whole milk made her stomach churn) and she left to find an empty place to ponder outside. Usually, her resting place was somewhere near the statue of Elizabeth Montgomery that she had grown so fond of, but today was different.

On this day in particular, there was a line, and Vada joined it patiently, tucking a wild strand of blue hair behind her ear as she kept her eyes to the ground, watching carefully as the patron in front of her stepped forward just slightly to close in on the counter.

The line lasted for several minutes, and Vada's neck quickly grew tired of aiming down, so she stretched and peered through the floor to ceiling windows. Salem was still nearly empty, as things in her town didn't usually pick up until well after noon, but there were still several people out and about.

She trailed her eyes to the statue, a soft smile tugging at the corners of her mouth as she struggled to contain her memories of the night before. The handsome young man who had been so kind to light her cigarette, and the strange chat they had shared after. As she moved forward in line, the smile faded, because it's morning now - and that moment had passed. Sure, she had given him an open invitation to find her, but her lack of specifics was sure to keep him away. He had no time, no location, and no real indication that she was telling the truth at all. There was no wayHarry Styles would find Vada Henley today.


But he did.

Because how many people in Salem have blue hair?

(The answer was two, but one was away for college and Harry didn't know that.)

He spotted her as soon as he approached the statue, which he finds sweetly ironic as that is where he first found her. But she was waiting in line for coffee and he wasn't sure how to continue. Was it weird that he found her despite her lack of given information? Maybe...but Harry Styles was never one to back away from a challenge.

Perhaps it would have been weird if he told her he had been awake and searching Salem for over an hour, having stopped in every possible coffee shop, searching for her blue hair. He figured he would keep that fact to himself. He didn't want to appear desperate - so he turned his back to the coffee shop window and waited.

And in that exact moment, because timing was everything and almost always against her, Vada took her latte from the barista and turned, catching sight of her beloved statue, and someone that looked shockingly familiar from behind. How many people in Salem had expertly crafted buns of chestnut hair?

(The answer was one: Harry Styles. He was a unique lad.)

Vada immediately tucked herself into the sliver of wall that was not exposed by a window, and pressed her back to it, her breath hitching as she realized he hadcome for her. Half of her soared, fluttering with anticipation. The other half felt a bit sick, and wished desperately that there was a back way out of the coffee shop.

Vada was not ready to face Harry Styles in the daylight.

But he was there and waiting for her and when she peaked through the glass of the door, he turned, the rising sun reflecting off his hair, causing him to squint in the sunlight. But he somehow looked more angelic. Surely too good for Vada to even be allowed near. His lips curved into a knowing smile and she realized that she had already been spotted. He had the upper hand. Again. All hope for an escape drained, Vada collected herself and squared her shoulders, standing straight and tall as she finally exited the shop, pretending to have not just had a mild breakdown due to his presence.

"Morning Vada!" He greeted loudly, hands stuffed deep in the pockets of his long, black coat.
"Good morning, Harry," she returned, coming to a full stop and teetering awkwardly. "Have any trouble finding me?"

With a smirk, he shook his head, "Not at all. You stand out, to be honest."

Lowering her head shyly, her feet scuffed the ground.

Picking up the moment in perfect timing, Harry knew exactly what to say, "Could you show me around the town? Been wanting a tour, no one will take me. They think I ask too many questions..."

Vada smiled in spite of herself; Harry Styles being a curious child was a stereotype she could absolutely get behind. "I guess, wanna start now? Or do want a coffee or some breakfast first?"

"I'm all set, had some tea before I left, are you ready?"

Clutching her coffee to her chest, Vada nods. "I think so, just deciding where to start..."

Harry turned dramatically and extended his arms widely, the width of them nearly enough to hug the entire statue of Elizabeth Montgomery without a stretch. "Start here!"

She shoudn't have been surprised at this action, but she is, because Harry Styles is quite possibly the most upbeat person she has ever encountered.

"Right, so...this is Elizabeth Montgomery, who played Samantha in Bewitched. It was donated in 2005 by TV Land, and some people in the town were happy about it - but some were definitely not. Salem has a reputation, as you may know - and a lot of people thought it was sort of a mockery. But, it's still here and I love it."

She paused for a moment and Harry caught a blush creeping into her cheeks. It was a genuine expression and it pushed a smile up Harry's face, lighting his eyes as he listened intently. Vada was already feeling overwhelmed by his attention and was hoping to move along quickly, somewhere that had them side by side and not face to face.

"You can rub her nose for good luck, if you want, then we can move on."

Harry's eyes lit up and he immediately reached out, closing his eyes for show and rubbing the nose of the statue. "Where to next? You're good at this!"

Vada bowed her head in thanks, and pointed ahead of her, waiting for Harry to fall into step beside her. When he did, she picked up her pace and led him to the first cemetery she could find. If they had come here just one day prior, the grounds would have been overflowing with tourists with cameras, but today - Vada and Harry were the only visitors. This pleased Vada greatly. Harry, on the other hand, had a growing look of terror on his sweet face.

"Cemetery?"

"In Salem, they're better than the museums. There's nothing glamorized here, it's all the bitter truth."

She guided him through the main section of graves, where most of the stones looked alike and nothing really stood out. It was beautiful in the autumn glow, with the leaves falling over everything, but the most interesting part was to come, and Vada's love of her hometown was taking over so strongly that she pulled Harry by his elbow through a small stone entry way and stopped suddenly, motioning outward with her arms wide.

"This is my favorite place in Salem," she admitted to Harry, "The Witch Trials Memorial. Every stone here is in memorium of someone who died during the trials."

While they slowly browsed, Harry reading each stone as he passed, he looked to Vada to see that she was watching him, gauging his reaction to her tour so far. He was morbidly curious now, but mostly he was intrigued by how passionate Vada was speaking about these things.

"Can you tell me more about the trials? I don't think I was ever properly educated on them."

She grinned immediately, falling in step beside him as he carefully made his way through the stones.
"The witch trials started in February of 1692 and lasted until May of 1693. Twenty people were executed; nineteen hanged and one pressed to death--"

Harry stopped, "Pressed?"

Vada nodded with such enthusiasm that Harry was mildly taken aback, but she wasn't stopping, "Giles Corey is the only person known to have been pressed to death, and it's because he refused to plead and be tried. They stripped him naked and laid him flat in a pit in the open field beside the prison, then covered him with a plank of wood. Six men lifted huge stones and placed them one at a time on the board; he was silent the entire time. Over two days, he was asked to plead guilty to witchcraft, but he refused and instead, asked for more weight. They fed him three mouthfuls of bread and water and supposedly, right as he was finally dying - he cursed the sheriff and the entire town of Salem."

Vada's eyes were wide with her excitement for telling the story and Harry's were wide with absolute terror.

"He was 71," she finished, a wicked grin spreading across her face.

Harry was silent and stopped when he reached the stone with Giles Corey's name on it. He stared down at it in a stunned silence as Vada continued on, clearly in her element.

"That really was the most gruesome event that took place during the trials, and all because he refused to plead guilty. Gotta give him some credit, I think - he stuck to his guns. Anyway, the trials really started when Betty Parris and Abigail Williams started having fits that would probably be diagnosed as seizures or psychotic breaks these days. They were the first, but over a short period of time, more girls around that same age began to have similar fits and even interrupted church sermons...which was a huge no-no during Puritan times. Three people were arrested and accused of afflicting the girls.

Sarah Good was arrested for her "appalling reputation", basically...she was homeless and a beggar, and that just didn't look good. The towns people accused her of leading children into temptation instead of to salvation.

Sarah Osbourn was arrested for having "self-interests" in mind after she remarried, it didn't help that she rarely attended church. She wanted control of her son's inheritance and the town really didn't like that.

Tituba was the third accused, and there's a very good chance she was arrested for being black. She was accused of exposing the young girls to stories from Malleus Maleficarum, which is filled with tales of leading men astray and sexual interactions with demons and all-around bad stuff."

Vada stopped and waited for Harry to catch up, his face had fallen even more and she thought maybe he was going to be sick. She let her smile fade, but the light in her eyes remained - she wasn't enjoying torturing the sweet boy with the awful tales, but nothing fascinated her more than the information she was sharing, and it wasn't often she had someone willing to listen to her ramble on.

"They were outcasts, and condemned for their inability to blend with the town, essentially. Pretty ridiculous, when you think about it."

Harry nodded and Vada was pleased to see he was still coherent. "Are you alright?"

Harry nodded again, "Yeah, just...didn't realize how awful it was. This all happened here? In Salem?"

"Sort of, it was broken up between a few places. Salem Village, which is now called Danvers, Salem Town, Ipswich, and Andover. It was absolute madness. Mass hysteria, honestly. The girls who started the entire mess were probably mentally ill and in a time of religious extremism, that just looked like the devil's work. These days, it's a good story and a lesson to learn about taking it easy when it comes to religion. Nobody actually used witchcraft on anyone, but twenty people were executed and five others died in prison, one was an infant."

Harry was solemn now, head bowed at the exit of the cemetery as Vada carefully patted his shoulder. "The cemetery tour is over now, I have something much more positive to show you next. It's a ways out, so you'll be able to...recover," a soft laugh escaped her lips and Harry snapped up to look at her.

"I just didn't expect it to be so...bad. I've heard about it, of course, but -- I had no idea."

"Most people don't, it's okay. Most people actually think it had something to do with the occult, but it really didn't. These innocent people were accused of witchcraft simply because they didn't fit into the insane standards that the Puritans set when they came from England. It's sad, really. Especially since a lot of people still deal with persecution for things out of their control, just not to such extremes."

They walked now, putting the cemetery behind them, Harry's head down as he listed and nodded, hands deep in his pockets again. His shoulders were relaxing, but his face remained solemn. The morning was definitely taking a turn he hadn't been expecting.

"You know a lot about this," he thought aloud.

"Comes with the territory, I think. I've lived here my entire life, I think it'd be insulting if I didn't know it."

While they walked, Vada finished her coffee, depositing the cup in the trash as their next stop began to materialize in front of them. Even without her introducing it to him, Harry had a feeling that's where they were headed.

"This is the Friendship of Salem," she started, grinning as she saw Harry's eyes light up. "I figured you would appreciate this after the cemetery, if for nothing other than the name. It's much less morbid than the start of our tour."

As they closed the distance between them and the ship, Harry was peeling off his coat and rolling up the sleeve of his tee shirt to reveal a tattoo of a massive sailing ship.

"I don't think it's the same boat, but look! I love ships!"

He was grinning wildly and Vada couldn't help but match his excitement. His happiness was infectious and with each step, she was filling with pride - for her town, her knowledge of it, and Harry's unadulterated interest in it. It was refreshing, to say the least, that somebody was so invested in listening to Vada go on and on.

"Perfect! This is a replica of the original, because nobody is sure what actually happened to it, but it was built here in Salem by Enos Briggs and launched in May of 1797. As of now, it's used mostly as a stationary museum, but it is fully functioning and sets sails throughout the year."

Harry had broken away from Vada and was standing with his back to the ship, his tattooed arm exposed and his other out wide, "Take a picture, Vada!"

Searching out her phone and snapping a few pictures as Harry changed poses and was all-around absolutely strange, Vada smiled the entire time. She wouldn't know until much later when she went over the pictures, but Harry never made eye contact with the camera - only her smile.


The tour ended when Harry made it halfway back to the statue and collapsed on the empty side of a picnic table that a small family on the other side was trying to enjoy their lunch at. Vada apologized with a softly embarrassed smile and dragged Harry to his feet, pulling his through the doors of her favorite ice cream shop.

"Sit, I'll be right back."

He did as he was told and made a show of sprawling out across the table, playing up his exhaustion as Vada tried not to smile as she watched him from the corner of her eye. She ordered a large scoop of Buttercrunch and brought it back with two spoons.

"Eat," she told him, "Buttercrunch is scientifically proven to cure Salem Tour exhaustion."

Harry raised a teasing eyebrow in her direction, but dove in anyway, moaning obscenely as the ice cream melted in his mouth.

She shrugged in understanding, "Like I said."

"Didn't expect to walk so much," Harry said as he swallowed, digging his spoon in and taking far more than he needed in one bite.

"Nobody ever does, Salem Tours aren't for the weak of feet."

"Definitely agree there. You're good at them though, you don't even look tired," he said, stuffing his mouth with the dripping spoon and nearly choking. Vada only shook her head in response.

"You should give tours for a living," he said once most of the ice cream had been swallowed.

Vada grinned, "I do. Every September and most of October, until the tourists get out of hand. I've been giving tours since I was fifteen."

Everything made sense to Harry now, "Now I get why you were so pleased with my horror in the cemetery. You must get a lot of those reactions."

"Yeah, sort of...yours was definitely my favorite. Most people know what to expect, I don't think you had idea what I had in store for you."

"Definitely not, I'll never look at rock gardens the same."

Vada laughed out loud and Harry took her moment of distraction to stuff the remaining ice cream in his mouth, struggling desperately to breath and swallow at the same time.

"Best ice cream ever," he sighed when he finally swallowed it all, wiping his face with the back of his hand. "Thanks Vada!"

Vada just watched him with wide eyes, "I can't believe you finished that without me. Haven't you heard of manners?"

"Sure I have, but you punched me yesterday - this was payback."

Vada blushed deeply and nodded, "Fine. We're even."

"Not yet, you owe me those pictures. Here, take my number," he started, to which Vada raised a skeptical eyebrow. "What?!"

"Is this just an excuse to get my number?"

Harry grinned dangerously, "Maybe, but I really want those pictures. I looked great, don't you think?"

Vada rolled her eyes. She didn't answer. But her cheeks did darken as she punched in the number Harry rattled off. He was very pleased with himself, once again.

"I should go, Vada, I promised a friend of mine I'd help him out this morning. Can I walk you home?"

Vada shook her head immediately, the high of the morning beginning to wear off. "No, that's fine - I have some things to do in town before I head back." Harry nodded, then stood and threw away the empty ice cream cup, standing directly in front of Vada, who was still sitting.

"I'm going to call you later, and I'm going to ask you out on a proper date for tomorrow, because today was fun - but I refuse to consider that much exercise and absolute horror a date. Is that okay?" Harry was very serious, but his eyes smiled down at her and Vada swallowed thickly, nodding.

"Yeah, that's okay."

"Good. Thanks for today, Vada. I'm happy I stalked around Salem for an hour until I tracked you down. It was definitely worth it."

Leaving her with his final admission of the day, Harry exited the shop and Vada was left in her seat with her cheeks matching the pink color of the sky, head swimming with the surreality of her morning. Harry Styles was an interesting addition to her life and in the sunshine of Salem, Vada couldn't find a shadow of doubt anywhere in her mind.

Notes

We're caught up to what I've posted on 1dff.com - if you're enjoying this, let me know! You can check out my fic tumblr for inspiration posts...get inside the story, ya know?! I love it and I hope you like it at least a little.

xx Katie

Fic Tumblr: glorysos