Eleven (From the Midnight Snacks Collection-2019)

Danny Wilkinson struggled to settle into the new office purchased for his insurance business. Despite the initial excitement, the new property owner butterflies just never arrived and they never would. Perhaps it was the stress of the move. Moline, Illinois, to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, was a minor change -- an area large enough to have a few big box stores, and a couple of Burger World's. It simply came nothing close to the creature comforts of Chicago or St. Louis.

Danny purchased the 1940s era Masonic building from Elk’s Snow Cone Enterprises. The now-defunct local chain had two other area locations to the north and east of the downtown district. This location was stated to be the slowest of the three and, ultimately, what led to the organization’s greater collapse a year earlier. At least that’s the story the wife of the late owner, Bill Elk, went with when selling it to Danny.

The arrangement of the building didn’t make sense as a snow cone stand, but given the age, he assumed it had housed20 a great variety of businesses through the years. A quick internet search of the address revealed the property had last been for sale 11 years ago. Johnny Lathrop was identified as the realtor on the previous listing. The fact that the old website was still live struck Danny as odd, but given past experiences with real estate, he brushed it off as insignificant.

The price on the building was fantastic and he was in a hurry to get out of Illinois. Cash deal -- no lawyers and no realtors. The perfect approach to expediting his move in. Neighboring businesses in the Quail Ridge district were scarcer than Danny first realized. From bail bondsmen to lawyers, carpet cleaners to travel agents, three out of every four businesses were vacant, accompanied with boarded up windows and broken glass.

I'm sure the economy will bounce back, Eastern Iowa is brimming with potential, he thought.

Danny's introversion made facing clients the hardest part of the job. A five-minute office visit earlier on his day of arrival left him mentally and emotionally gasping for air.

There wasn't enough incoming work to need anyone else either. The desk in the lobby area sat vacant. He placed a nametag placard on it-- Heidi Jacobs, furthermore adding a phone and an outdated computer and monitor.

She belongs here... he thought. This building is too much space for me.

As he explored, he found other peculiar phenomena. Including a bizarre exclusivity with the number eleven. 11 rooms. 11 windows. 11 steps into the basement. 11 cabinets in the kitchen. 11 outlets.

He set up a desk in the lobby to give the appearance of having an assistant and even went as far as putting the nameplate of his former assistant, Heidi Jacobs, on the desk along with a phone and an outdated cream-colored computer and monitor. For some reason, while setting it up, he had a feeling she belonged there.

...

He’d left Heidi dead in Illinois. It happened early the previous week. Not by his own doing, but ironically by an uninsured motorist who tried to hit and run. Ever since receiving the news, he had become a little fixated on odd details. The recurrence of the number 11 in the building’s architecture had intrigued him. It even led him to internet searches on the significance of 11 in numerology and any other 11’s that were worthy of note or previously recorded. Most people might not make these kinds of observations about the building or home they purchased on the first week of a move in, but he did. This had kept him exceptionally preoccupied during the slow start. A question going through his mind initially revolved around what the designer of the building’s reasoning would be for the symbiotic relationship with 11 all throughout its architecture. Was it by some grand design...? Or, perhaps it was a complete coincidence. He assumed it was intentional given the well-organized craftsmanship and the substantial amount of surrounding architecture erected by the local Iowa chapter of freemasons. He was unsure, but nonetheless, possessed a mind racing all alone as he settled into the building.

Eleven, the first repdigit, the prime number that comes after ten and before twelve, the imperfect number of apostles after Judas betrayed Christ, Spinal Tap’s volume control limit, the great Phil Simms jersey number, the list goes on and on. This was only one of the first days he had made a somewhat obsessive correlation to the number.

....

He tried looking up Johnny Lathrop in the local phonebook and the online white pages directory, but remained unsuccessful. He then performed a quick search on the name Johnny Lathrop and Cedar Rapids, and it pointed him to a locatetheirgrave social media website and obituary page. Given the oddity of and repetition with eleven, he was not surprised with the when Johnny had expired, 11:11 PM, 11/11/2011. What had Johnny done to have this unknown eleven omen put on him, and to what extent was it about to affect him? He looked at his watch. It was 11:11AM. Time for a lunch break. The mind can be a powerful thing in isolation. Danny knew he needed a change of scenery to get his mind off eleven and in a better place.

Being new to the area, he looked up the former address of the Elk’s Snow Cone location on the north side of town and headed that direction. What was interesting was that the property was not FOR SALE BY OWNER, like the Elk’s property he purchased was. It was instead being offered by a local realtor, Gerald Hicks. He wrote down the phone number from the green and yellow sign on the front of the building, 319-362-0511. It ended in 11, but he felt like that was probably just an unwelcome coincidence.

He dialed the number. It rang and rang and rang, a total of 11 times.

Gerald picked up, sounding a bit uneasy, “Hello, can I help you? I see the out of town area code. I’m only a realtor for the greater Cedar Rapids area. I don’t deal with out of towners.”

“Hi Gerald, it’s Danny Wilkinson, I’m a new insurance agent in town and wanted to ask

some questions about the Elk’s Snow Cone property you have listed on the north side on Horton Street.”

Gerald, always suspicious of non-local numbers, cautioned Danny, “Okay, thanks, Danny. Since you’re new in town, I’d recommend we think about a different property today. The property on Horton wouldn’t be a good fit for you.”

Danny inquisitively replied, “What do you mean? What does that have to do with anything?”

Gerald cut him off before he could go any further, “I’m not going to continue this discussion. Look up my website and call me if you see anything else listed that suits you better.”

The line went dead.

...

As if there wasn’t enough mystery racing through Danny’s mind already... He didn’t know what he was mixed up in or if the ornery realtor had more to share face-to-face than he was willing to do over the phone. He grabbed a Doughy Double from Burger World and took it back to the office. He began to set up his workspace in the room that he claimed as his office, the third door on the left. After working a couple of hours and munching on his hamburger off and on, he caught his breath and sat down in the office chair. It seemed to have been left in the room by the previous owner. It reclined a little, looked like leather, swiveled in circles, had armrests, and could be raised or lowered with relative ease-- a good, middle of the road choice from the locally-owned store, From Farm to Office, an Iowa staple. He leaned back peering at the ceiling with a blank stare, just trying to clear his mind. Losing Heidi was tough. Most of the walls were made of solid oak, and each of the ceilings had a metal checker-boxed pattern throughout the building. He noticed the pattern of eleven occurring yet again.

He heard the ding of the front door open and then heard what sounded like a man’s voice calling rather loudly in a whiney and nasally tone, “Hello, anyone here?”

Footsteps approached closer. He was about to speak up to call them back into his office when a head peered around the corner.

A strangely dressed, bald-headed man in a brown trench coat and checkered belt spoke in a very northern accent, “Why’d ya pick this one, buddy?! Surely, you could have chosen another one.”

Danny responded, “This one? You mean the room for my office, the third room on the left? Three is my fav....”

The man interrupted, “NO, NO, NO! Why did you choose this building? Don’t you know what happened in here?! Or can I spell it out for ya in plainer Yankee English?”

Danny replied, “Please humor me.”

“There ain’t no humor in this conversation, buddy. That realtor Lathrop did himself in in the lobby right next to where you have that desk there. Story goes... he drank nearly a dozen buckets of that cherry snow cone syrup. It caused a rapid and uncontrollable ventricular fibrillation, and he collapsed to the ground dead. The doctor who did the autopsy said he weighed 111 pounds. It was weird. That many buckets of cherry snow cone syrup couldn’t be good for anyone anyhow, could it? You would have figured he would have had a lot of it in his stomach at the time of death. The Gazette said it was only full of a cup of coffee. All the rest was just pourin’ out of his pores like sweat-- red syrupy sweat. You get the picture now?!! It was all just a little too strange for my liking!“

Danny interrupted, “Wait, what did you say your name was?”

The man walked around the corner out of the line of sight, but Danny never heard the front door open.

“That was weird,” Danny said aloud to himself.

His office had a window that looked right into the center of Oak Tree Street and the almost forgotten Quail Ridge Park. There were no homeless, no hot dog vendors, no dogs being walked, just a man sitting behind his makeshift cobbler and shoe shining stand without a customer in sight and a copy of the Cedar Rapids Gazette newspaper. Danny debated on if he should go out and ask the cobbler what he knew about the area, but was admittedly a little shaken up by the strange things that had happened over the past couple of hours.

...

Danny was single with no children, no siblings, and his mom and dad were living in Fayetteville, Arkansas, in an assisted living facility. He really hadn’t made any significant connections in the Cedar Rapids area at this point. The closest thing he had to a relationship in his first few days in Cedar Rapids was the one he had with the drive-through window shift supervisor at Burger World, a young man with blond hair and a goatee that would tell him his order before he could even speak into the intercom. He had never deviated from the #2, a Doughy Double. He’d had lunch and dinner there a handful of times already, so this wasn’t surprising to him. To perfect the burger, he had very particular stipulations-- no pickles, no lettuce, extra ketchup, a side of French fries, and to substitute the drink for a chocolate shake. It was only 49 cents more for the modification. He had his $6.79 ready, and he paid cash, a five, a one, four dimes, two nickels, a quarter, and four pennies. Whether he subconsciously realized that he was paying with 11 coins or not was unclear.

He tried to get his composure. Was Cedar Rapids really this strange? He didn’t think so before arriving, but it was sure starting to seem that way. He went out of his office into the corridor. He stopped to think for a moment and looked up. He noticed the 11 bulb light fixture chandelier piece that graced the lobby area. A couple of the bulbs had a splash of red on them. He climbed on top of the desk that he had set up and inspected it closer. Sure enough, the bulbs and fixture smelled like cherry snow cone syrup. He didn’t know what to make of it-- that is, how the syrup had gotten that high, but assumed it to be a fluke by a customer or employee of Elk’s Snow Cones.

“Embarrassing for Mrs. Elk that they never cleaned it up before selling the place,” he thought to himself.

As to the fate of the late Mr. Elk, he wasn’t sure. Mrs. Elk didn’t volunteer that information either. He knew that Mrs. Elk had nothing to do with the business as per their conversations at the time of the building purchase. Bill Elk’s obituary was vague and undescriptive as to his cause of death. He got the vibe that it was not of natural causes and considerably unexpected from the demeanor of Mrs. Elk.

...

He returned to his apartment building for a little bit and found that his door had been forced open. He hesitantly entered the room and began to inspect for an intruder or anything else out of the ordinary. As he went through the apartment, he observed that a large floor length mirror and his old ’57 Chevy pickup truck lamp had gone missing. As far as he could tell, nothing else seemed to be unaccounted for. Making the rounds throughout the rest of the apartment, he observed no intruder. He did notice that the bedroom window was unlatched and partially opened.

He heard a whirring and whooshing sound and the window slammed shut. It jammed his fingers. As he pulled them out, he noticed the imprint of the sill on them and began to gasp for air. He was having a panic attack. There was no help in sight. The best thing that he could do was to lie on the floor and take deep breaths. It would pass eventually. This wasn’t the first time that this had happened, and it probably wouldn’t be the last. There were so many unusual things happening since the move and Heidi’s death. He couldn’t afford to look back or think much about it at this point. He needed to stay the course to succeed in Iowa.

...

He went back to his office on Maple Street that evening and unlocked the door. As he came inside, he noticed the second room on the left had a light turned on. He knew that he had not turned the light on in there before. When he came into the room, he saw the missing ’57 Chevy lamp plugged in on the floor and turned on.

“How bizarre,” he thought to himself.

“I know I didn’t bring this thing up here.”

He was actually very protective of the lamp and had concerns that it would get broken, either by a client or one of their children, as a result of their curiosity or recklessness. It was a unique sight to see and had been given to him by his father when he was just a child, so it had considerable sentimental value to him.

He hadn’t posted the business’s phone number, nor had he purchased a phone to hook up yet. He suddenly heard a phone ringing down the hall. He went to find it and was having trouble locating it. There wasn’t much furniture in the building, and the wood floors made it echo much louder than might be expected.

He heard a voice down the hallway, “You looking for this, buddy?”

As he arrived, the bald-headed visitor from earlier in the day was holding an old rotary phone in the very back room on the right. Danny hadn’t actually entered the room yet. He only saw him through the door while standing in the hallway. As he crossed the threshold of the room, the man disappeared. He realized the mirror that was missing from his home was actually in this room and seemed to reflect a different dimension altogether. Danny stepped out of the room with the mirror still in his line of sight and feeling bewildered.

He looked up again from the hallway into the room. He saw a man wearing dental garb and hovering over a reclined dental chair while he spoke on the phone. He couldn’t make out the patient in the chair.

He was in mid-conversation, “Yes, that’s right. Send him on down. I will straighten this situation out. It will take some time, and it will definitely cost you.“

He peered out at Danny in the reflection of the large mirror and smiled. Though a dentist, pride in his teeth seemed questionable as the man appeared to only have eleven teeth, six on top and five on the bottom with various ones missing and no molars.

He didn’t speak directly to Danny. As Danny walked back into the room again, the reflection vanished. All that was in the room was the mirror from his apartment and a jug of leftover cherry snow cone syrup in the far corner. He walked over to the mirror within the room and saw his reflection. He noticed his appearance looked exhausted and a trickle of red syrup dripping down the sides of his mouth and all over his freshly-pressed white oxford shirt. When he looked down at himself, he didn’t observe the same. There was no red syrup, and he wasn’t feeling as tired as he looked in the mirror.

He went back to his office and sat down in the chair. He swiveled around and peered out the window to the park across the street. It was a different scene and a different time altogether. Hot dog and drink vendors lined the street. Dogs were being walked. Fathers and sons were playing football. Couples were having picnics on blankets. The cobbler was in the same spot as well with his copy of the Cedar Rapids Gazette. The fashion of everyone around must have been at least 20 years outdated or more. Twenty-two years to be exact. The rule of 11 seemed to be in play again. Twenty-two was a multiple of eleven. What was he seeing? WHEN was he seeing? How was he seeing? Why was he seeing? When he turned back around to his desk, he realized that the room had changed. Then, he noticed a nameplate and a couple of diplomas on the walls for Dr. Lance Jefferson. Not only that, the smell of the office had changed for the worse. The building had transformed into a dentist's office.

He had no knowledge or recollection of dentistry, but he was now dressed up for the part. When he felt a cool draft on top of his head, he realized he was now bald, and his appearance had changed to the man that he had encountered earlier in the day. This bizarre transformation was causing him to panic. He returned the lobby and noticed some patients in the waiting area. He had forgotten his assistant, Heidi Jacobs, was actually from Cedar Rapids. She was considerably younger, and sitting in the chair, waiting for her teeth to be cleaned. She was a patient of Dr. Jefferson in her late teenage years and early 20s before moving to Illinois. She laid down her purse and a book that she had brought in to read while she waited, One Dark Fate by acclaimed author, Richie Bachson. She had been cursed, but she didn’t know it yet.

He went over to speak to her, and the northern accent of Dr. Jefferson came out of his mouth just like the man speaking to him earlier, “Heidi, what can we do for ya today?

Heidi replied, “I’m just in for a cleaning, doc... Wait, how did you know my name? It’s my first visit.”

“Just a lucky guess. Come on to the back,” the doctor replied.

As they were walking to the back, Danny (appearing as Dr. Jefferson) was thinking, “Should I warn Heidi about her future. Maybe I can alter history and save her.”

As he arrived back to the main teeth cleaning area, the last door on the right, he asked Heidi to get in the chair. She entered the room first and sat down. As he crossed through the doorway, the room transformed into a storage room for the Elk’s Snow Cone business. He looked in the mirror and saw that he was wearing a nametag, which read BILL ELK – OWNER AND GENERAL MANAGER. He had gained 85 pounds and grown a tuft of gray hair back in on top of his head. He was holding two jugs of cherry snow cone syrup in his left and right hands, respectively. Once again, Danny looked down, and his appearance had returned back to himself. Only the reflection in the mirror revealed him to be Bill Elk.

He went back to his office, swiveled around in the chair, and peered out the window. Quail Ridge Park looked about half as full as it had the previous time, but still had signs of life. The cobbler was set up in the same location with his copy of the Cedar Rapids Gazette. Bill realized the man didn’t appear any younger or older in all three of the time periods he had seen. He realized that he was now seeing 2011 and had previously seen, 2000 and 2022.

When he turned around from the window in the chair, he had taken on the form of Bill, the heavyset snow cone shop owner. He went out into the hallway and saw a very slender red-headed man in the lobby.

The man said, “Hey Bill, what you know, partner?”

Danny (as Bill) recognized the man to be the same as the man in the photo from the obituary that he had seen. This was the realtor, Johnny Lathrop. Johnny placed his cowboy hat and his billfold on the counter.

Danny (as Bill) replied, “I’m doing really swell, my friend, just real swell. What can I do you for today?”

Johnny replied, “I’ll take my usual. How ‘bout a large cherry snow cone.”

Danny (as Bill) answered, “I’ll head to the back to get you one.”

Danny (as Bill) thought to himself, “Maybe I should warn this guy to lay off of the snow

cones, especially given the strange fate Dr. Jefferson had mentioned.”

He tried to speak a word of warning, but could not utter the words. He could only speak on the track of the original conversation that transpired. He was reliving Bill’s experience. What else could he do? He started trying to handwrite a message to help since he couldn’t speak one. It didn’t work. All he could do was write words like: Bill, snow, cone, Elk, take, care, now. He was trying to think if there was any pattern of these words to get the message across to Johnny that might help.

He tried, “NOW TAKE SNOW CONE –BILL.”

It was not possible. Johnny just thought Bill was going out of his mind as he watched him frantically trying to scribble out a message. Danny (as Bill) went back to his office to think for a minute. He realized in every instance of the building that he had seen, the room that he had declared his office in the present time (2022), was also ironically the main office for the other occupants in the previous instances. He began trying to write a message to Johnny again.

11.11.11.11.11.11.eat...snow...cone...11.11.11.11.11. BILL ELK.

88

Johnny came around the corner and saw Bill writing frantically, “What are you doing, guy? You need a shrink??!!“

Danny (as Bill) could only shake his head negatively and pointed at Johnny.

“You think I need one?!! You jerk!!!” Jonny said.

Danny (as Bill) nodded his head frantically up and down to indicate that it was in Johnny’s best interest to get help.

Almost as if Johnny was controlled by something other than himself, Danny (as Bill) watched him walk down the hallway into the back room where the extra snow cone syrups were stored and began carrying them to the front of the building. One by one, he had carried all eleven jugs to the front.

“I can count to eleven, Bill, you happy now!!?? You want me to prove it to you, bud?!” he asked sarcastically.

Growing more frustrated by the minute, Danny (as Bill) ran down the hallway to the back room on the right, trying to get Johnny to follow him and lure him out of his predestined fate. When he entered the room, he peered into the mirror, and Johnny disappeared. His appearance returned to himself in the mirror, but he noticed the red snow cone syrup and the exhaustion in his face in the reflection again. He looked down and realized this time, the reflection was a reality. He ran down the hallway back to the front. He looked up at the 11 light chandelier again and alarmingly saw himself swinging from it with the jug of cherry syrup dripping all over him hanging above and pouring out slowly.

He began to panic and thought to himself, “Have I lost my mind? Am I really seeing this? I’m starting to feel sick.”

He went to try and pull himself down and saw his body collapse to the floor. There was nothing else he could do to help.

...

He could hear the phone ringing again. He ran to try and answer it. He had to find it first. He figured that it was still in the back room. That was where it was when Dr. Jefferson and Bill had the place. He went back and found it on the floor next to the mirror.

He tried to pick up the phone and heard the voice of realtor, Gerald Hicks. Danny could not communicate.

Gerald’s tone was harsh, “I told you outsiders had no business in the Elk’s Snow Cone enterprise building on the north side. I wish you would have listened. What made you think that this one would be any different? Bill Elk was manipulated to buy all 3 properties. He told me himself and couldn’t explain how or why--all the way till his death right there in Quail Ridge Park. Some cobbler working there said he died of a heart attack in the park the other day.”

Danny tried to reply, “I am listening to you, Gerald! Can you hear me?”

Only faint gravelly whispers came out of his mouth, and it was unintelligible through the phone....

“Just get out of there as quickly as you can... before it is too late. Don’t you realize it’s November 11th? The town is empty because it’s time for the Annual Life Reaping Festival. 11’s have been cursed here ever since 11.11.1901. A Yankee Cobbler haunts Quail Ridge Park for the eleventh month of the eleventh year. Stay away from there!!!”

...

Danny looked at his watch, 11.11.2022, 11:11AM. The clock seemed to have reset to when he had left the office earlier for lunch. He ran outside as quickly as he could and made eye contact with the cobbler, who smiled with a menacing grin.

....

He went back to his apartment to try and send himself some kind of warning message. He couldn’t get in. He forced his way in through the window. He caught up to himself, examining the apartment and couldn’t seem to do anything to get his own attention as if in a dream-like state. He slammed the window shut on his fingers. It was no use. Time had run out. He saw the Yankee Cobbler break into the front door of the apartment and steal the mirror and the lamp. He knew where they were going now. The building always required two personal relics from the owner or a guest of the building for the curse to work. With these conditions being met each time, the cobbler would be able to return in the eleventh month of the eleventh year.

Danny realized that he wasn’t Danny anymore and hadn’t been for the last little while. He had taken on the form of Lance Jefferson, and the cobbler had permitted him to visit himself earlier in the day on 11/11. The caveat was that he could not tell himself who he really was or his final fate. He could only share the fate of the previous victims.

...

As he arrived at the office one final time, he realized the building he had purchased was 1111 Maple Street, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Zip code 11111. He looked in the mailbox and found a card that explained things better, clarifying what he had just experienced. It was etched on parchment paper in black-inked calligraphy. It appeared to be quite dated, but it was strangely well preserved. He began to examine the message, wishing he had taken the time to check in the mailbox at some point before the present.

RULES OF THE 1111 YANKEE COBBLER CURSE

 A person cannot reappear as themselves once dead. They can only appear as another victim of the building.

 The Yankee Cobbler can appear as himself or any one of the previous victims and can free roam on his terms for the 11th month of the 11th year in the Quail Ridge District.

 The victim must be present in the building on 11/11. The death can happen at the Yankee Cobbler’s choosing in any 11th month of an 11th year (not required to be the same year of visit).

 Multiple victims can be in the building if it is in a time zone of intersect with when they were living.

 The current victim can alter form into another owner of building by swiveling in the chair in the 3rd room on the left after peering out the window at Quail Ridge Park.

 The current victim cannot communicate in written word outside of what the person in the original moment would have known.

 Two relics/belongings must be present from the victim for the curse to take effect.

 The current victim can travel to the previous 11/11’s using the rear room portal, but cannot alter the outcome of another victim or themselves.

 The current victim can only communicate words on the predestined path.

 The Yankee Cobbler dictates all other rules.

...

The time on his watch turned to 11:11PM, and his fate was sealed forever. Danny

Wilkinson, insurance agent, keeper and protector of 1111 Maple Street from this day forward. Trapped in a bizarre portal, helpless and hopeless as he waits for the next victim to arrive 11 years later.