CHAPTER 19: The White-Knuckle Storm Crawl Continues… Tales of Ghosts and Mass Sociogenic Hysteria in Coquille. 

At forty miles per hour, the trip from Florence to Coos Bay took every bit of two. For Professor T, the disappearance of what little sunlight was leaking through the bloated clouds resembled a gray leviathan slowly swallowing the sky. The colors bled out, leaving behind a dark and angry deluge of cold, suffocating water. Professor T hoped Billie wasn’t feeling something similar… an overwhelming sensation of being waterboarded by Posiden. 

As par usual, Buck was playing a reassuring role in the passenger seat…his low-key southern gentleman’s confidence bolstering Billie’s stoic resolve. Of course, they had no choice as darkness was near total and the lonely forty-eight mile stretch was mostly devoid of pull-over spaces. 

They HAD to soldier on. 

Contributing to Professor T’s claustrophobic dread was a combination of Buck and Billie’s hushed tones and Jack’s untroubled snoring. It was disconcerting for Mork T as he could not imagine how anyone would be able to sleep through the pounding of drops the size of small water balloons, peppered by the occasional flash-bulb appearance of Zeus’ shocking bolts, and the delayed crashing of the Olympic bowling alley. Professor Thompson felt as if he had survived a staredown with the abyss in the two-plus hours it took to cover fifty miles… not to mention the hairy beast he could have sworn he saw lumbering through the lightning flashes as darkness was closing in.

As Billie guided the Chool Bus through Mother Nature’s extreme water hazard, she kept her eyes peeled for the sudden appearance of animals, vehicles, debris, or God forbid, people in the road. And though this may have been the most intense rain dump she’d ever had the chance to conquer, she was confident in the advice her grandfather gave for inclement weather.

“Never mind the posted speed limit… keep your wheels on the road, and keep your speed within the bounds of ‘reason and prudence.’” This advice served to earn Billie the gang’s trust as a calm, vigilant, responsible, True Blue Chool Bus pilot.

By the time the gang finally rolled into Coos Bay, the downpour had settled into a gentle, steady shower. The drops pattered on the roof most of the night and the soothing ambience served to lull all into a deep, dreamless slide into comatosity. When the morning sun finally made an appearance in Coos Bay, the gang took some time in the twenty-four-hour fitness center where they had parked for the night. Once all had their morning necessaries completed, some light breakfast food, some coffee, back on the road ventured the Forks. 

It was a clear sunny day when the bus rolled into Coquille. First stop? The home of Jack’s cousin, Janice. She and her sizable extended family were happy to welcome the Forks to their quaint little Oregon town. After introductions and some familial catch-up, Janice, tipped off by anecdotes of the gang’s time in Seattle, was reminded of the local Pho restaurant…all agreed…lunch at the Coquille Pho House.

Now, many consider this signature Vietnamese dish more than a nutritious, delicious meal, but also medicine. And with this medicinal dish, there is a process. First, the host brings each diner a plate with juicy wedged limes, a handful of fresh bean sprouts, a few sprigs of fragrant basil, and for those who believe their meal should have an opportunity to bite back, several slices of fresh jalapeno peppers.

Once the bowls arrive, diners prepare their medicinal Pho (oxtail soup) to their personal tastes. The proprietor furnishes accompanying spices at every table, hoisin sauce (seasoned soybean paste), chili sauce, Sriracha, fish oil, sugar, etc… you can gauge each diners’ capsaicin tolerance by the color of the oxtail broth. If it’s red it’s hot baybay. Now that the accompanying spices, herbs, and citrus had been added, one engages in a graceful ballet which involves chopsticks, and soup spoons. Swimming in the broth, noodles, and vegetable additions, depending on the order, will be your choice of meat: brisket, shrimp, beef tendon, tripe, mystery meat balls, etc.. Some like to enjoy the medicinal qualities of the hot broth, soaking in the healing steam, draining half of it before digging into the noodles and meat. These folks generally consume the whole bowl, noodles, broth, herbs, peppers, citrus and all. Others go right for the solids, sometimes leaving half a bowl of the healing liquid unconsumed. Professor T always shakes his head when he sees so much medicine wasted.

***

Back at Janice’s secluded house deep in the woods, the gang sat on lawnchairs in the warm June sun among romping children, goats, and pecking chickens. The conversations were easy and breezy. At some point, Janice’s brother, Jason, was chatting with Professor T about a land deal he was trying to secure. It was a plot in the wilderness that was rumored to be haunted by the tortured spirits of a recently demolished insane asylum. Now, Janice’s brother doesn’t believe in ghosts. In fact, he hosted a “paranormal activity debunker” podcast for a time… till he got board with it and decided to get a job in the sawmill as it paid a whole lot steadier. His real motive was triggered by another rumor, that gold could be found on the plot. He said it would take some digging and due diligence to determine the reality of that rumor.

As for the hauntings, all Jason could muster was a grunt of incredulity, trailing off to a smirking chuckle. “Seriously?” Jason sounded somewhat defensive. “I’ve interviewed dozens of folks convinced of spectral hauntings. After a while it gets predictable and boring. Do you remember the Scooby Doo cartoons? Of the ghost stories i investigated, way too many of them resembled stock characters and plots from that wildly entertaining Saturday morning diversion. Some corrupt opportunist or even local official is responsible for one of several outrages: environmental damage, estate dispute, businesses gone bust, almost always the motivation is financial. Some desperate grasping inspires an elaborate ruse involving a haunting of some kind. In the end, they either get away with their caper by way of mass sociogenic hysteria, or they make a mistake and get busted.” 

“Too bad we don’t have more of those precocious, inquisitive kids looking for mysteries to crack,” said Janice.

“Good luck with the site survey… i’d love to help pan for gold nuggets,” Billie was on autopilot, she was making sounds in order not to look bored.

Professor T was taking it all in. He considered Jason’s cock-sure outlook regarding mysterious phenomena a little too certain. In other words, Professor T was skeptical about Jason’t iron-clad skepticism. But turning his thoughts to Abigail Weiser’s inexplicable attack on his workplace integrity gave him pause. He was starting to wonder if he could accurately gauge the veracity of anybody’s fantastic story at face value. It seemed he was waking up to the depth of people’s public facing masks. He was starting to understand how the onion-like layers of personality can run deep and pungent.

Regardless, open-minded or not, Professor T considered the paranormal rumors about as real as Scooby Doo himself.

NEXT WEEK:
The gang lands in Eureka, NorCal, a beach town crawling with under-employed pirates giving the gang the heebie-jeebies, pushing them on to Redding.

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