Strawberry Spring
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Author | Stephen King |
|---|---|
| Country |  USA |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Horror, Fantasy short story |
| Released in | Night Shift |
| Publisher | Doubleday |
| Media Type | Print (Paperback) |
| Released | 1978 |
Strawberry Spring is a short horror/fantasy story by Stephen King, published in his Night Shift collection.
[edit] Plot summary
"Strawberry Spring" is the eleventh short story in Stephen King’s Night Shift.
The story begins with the unnamed narrator seeing the words "Springheel Jack" in a newspaper, which leads him to recount a time, about eight years ago, when he was at New Sharon College. His recollections are nostalgic, almost melancholy.
It was 1968 when the strawberry spring, a ‘false’ spring, much like Indian summer, broke. It brought a thick fog, which covered the campus at nighttime, providing perfect cover for ‘Springheel Jack.’ It was a good time for the narrator, as he recalls the things that they did and the music they listened to. This innocent façade was shattered when the body of a girl was found in a parking lot.
Several more students are murdered during the strawberry spring, and the narrator describes the reactions of the college community throughout this time; the contradicting rumours that are spread about the victims ("she was ugly but cute... she was a lesbian who had been murdered by her boyfriend" [1]), the blind panic of police and security guards (including a humorous anecdote about a student who passed out in the parking lot, only to be bagged and taken to the morgue by the security guard who found him) and the feelings of suspicions among students.
The narrator's most vivid recollections involve walking around in the fog. For him, the fog takes on a whimsical quality. As he walks around, unmindful of the dangers, he expects to see hobbits and other fantasy characters ready to greet him. The fog has become like a lover to him. It calls, and he answers.
In the final pages, the reader discovers the horrible truth of the narrator’s love affair with strawberry spring. Eight years later, strawberry spring has arrived again, and so has "Springheel Jack", who took another victim at New Sharon College the previous night. The narrator can’t remember where he was last night - the last thing he remembers is turning on his headlights to find his way through the "lovely creeping fog" [2]…but he wonders, with growing horror, why he’s afraid to open the trunk of his car. He muses on the word "trunk". He hears his wife crying in the next room because she thinks he was with another woman on the previous night, and he thinks she may be right.
[edit] References
- ^ Stephen King. "Strawberry Spring." In "Night Shift". (USA: Doubleday, 1990) pp228
- ^ Stephen King. "Strawberry Spring." pp236
