The Late Night Shift
There was a lot of activity at night
Jacob the train driver was driving the last train that night, like he always did. He enjoyed this job and continued it even when he slept at night, in his dreams. As a child, he loved looking at trains. The best gift he got one Christmas was a train set from his parents. He kept that as his treasured possession, even as an adult and did not allow his son Ronald to play with it. He bought the boy, a new train set, with modern trains, lines and other gimmicks. Jacob loved his set and he had so many fond memories of playing with those toy trains. Train spotting was fun and getting his dream job as a train driver was the best gift ever for the teenager, who had now completed several decades in the service of his beloved trains.
Sherry Ann loved her job at the post office. She had joined as a young girl straight out of university. Her love for the post office started when she was a child and she would see her father pasting stamps into his stamp albums. Richard was an avid philatelist, which was his hobby and which he took as seriously as his daytime job as a bookkeeper. It was not long before Sherry Ann had got her first stamp album, then her second and so many more as time went on. Every day, as she went to school and college, she looked with longing at the post office and wished she could get a job working at the place. A few years later, Sherry Ann’s wishes came true and she got her first job, working as a post-office counter clerk. A decade later, Sherry Ann, was made the postmistress of the large post office in the city. Sherry Ann loved her job, she went early every morning, returned late at night and she could do it forever.
Every night the cemetery was busy, as workers went in after a busy day at the office, while a large number of others, went off to work at the jobs, they did during their living years and which continued in the spirit life. Every single one of those souls loved their jobs and they could do it forever.
There was another man who loved his job and would do it as long as it was possible. Victor had a rather special job, it was that of a gravedigger and he enjoyed his job. However, he had another passion and that was removing the valuables from people as they lay in their coffins. This was something that first started when he removed the rings off his Grandfather’s swollen fingers when he passed away and continued doing this, by removing the pearl earrings from the corpse of his Grandmother. Victor was busy every night checking to make sure that all valuables were removed, as he felt that the dead did not need ornaments and precious possessions in the next life.
However, this Halloween, there was a surprise in store for the thief. Three families were informed by their dead relatives, through a psychic medium, that Victor the gravedigger had stolen the jewellery and other valuables from the deceased family members. When Victor went as usual to dig up and check the new coffin in the freshly dug grave, the empty coffin, was closed behind him and it was permanently sealed with special electronic locks. Victor was buried alive, in the special coffin built on the orders of the three families.
The next morning, when Victor tried to break out, it was impossible. That night, he stepped out of the locked box and walked to his home. He was happy to be free, but he could not drink his cup of coffee or eat a croissant-like he usually did. All Victor could do was go to his usual haunts and run for his life, whenever he was chased by the spirits of those whose valuables he stole as they lay lifeless in their graves. “Happy Halloween, Victor”, said the spirits on the graveyard shift. Jacob and Sherry Ann smiled as they returned back to the yard to rest, while others went to their favourite places of work to do the graveyard shift.
What a great story!