Ghost jogger

By Katie Benway
HippoPress.com

It's 2 a.m. on a blustery Friday night. My friends and I have all traveled home to Manchester on our Thanksgiving breaks from college. We sit huddled in a parked, nondescript Buick with the lights turned off, occasionally cranking up the heat to warm ourselves. We chat in hushed tones, our eyes focused on the road ahead. Snow falls lightly, covering our tire tracks. Suddenly, he appears.

He jogs with conviction, his eyes penetrating the darkness as he pushes forward. He does not respond to stimuli. We flash our lights, illuminating his body. We shout at him, calling for his attention. But he presses on, emotionless.

The white-haired man-or ghost, as some claim him to be-is a creature of habit. He always appears at 2:20 a.m., jogging down River Road. He wears the same red running shorts and sweatshirt and his white hair is never ruffled by the wind. His expression remains unchanged and his gaze never diverges. It is as if he is driven by some supernatural force, undaunted by what curious crowds may do to provoke him.

Does he ignore us? Or does he just not see us? Is he immune to human interaction?

Suddenly, one of my friends bounds out of the car and begins to jog alongside the man. He waves his hand in front of the jogger's face and shouts to him, but his attempts to illicit a response are futile. The jogger continues and my friend's pace slows to an awe-struck halt. We all watch as the ghostly jogger fades into a swirl of snow, oblivious to our presence.

We emerge from the car and congregate around our friend who seems to be a bit rattled from his experience. A stunned silence hangs in the air and I look up as a few last snowflakes fall into my face.

"The storm has stopped," I say and my friends nod.

Then I look in the direction of the ghostly jogger and notice something strange. There are no footprints. The thin layer of snow on the ground is smooth and even, completely undisturbed. I walk farther down the street, where his tracks might have appeared as the snow subsided, but there was no sign that he had ever passed.

We climb back into the car and pull away, unsure of what we've just seen. Why would a man jog at 2 a.m., even in the snow? Why doesn't he respond to piercing light? Why doesn't he leave footprints? These questions bring onlookers to the scene night after night to investigate, but a clear answer never seems to emerge. Maybe it's a real man. Maybe it's a ghost.