A Sea Gypsy Halloween

Once upon a time a very long time ago a beautiful Witch (her warty nose was the envy of all her friends) and a handsome Vampire (with the biggest canine teeth ever) fell in love. They met in a wood in Transylvania when the Witch was on holiday with her mum and dad.  Of course kissing was quite difficult with the length of her nose and quite dangerous with the sharpness of his teeth so they just held hands a lot.  The Vampire was too upset at the thought of his lovely Witch going back to her home in Berwick upon Twee with her mum and dad so he asked her to marry him.  The Witch said, “I will” and that should be where we say “and so they lived happily ever after”….

BUT nobody wants a Witch and a Vampire for their neighbours, well you can’t really blame people can you?  So try as they might they just could not find anywhere to live.  The years went by and they wandered from place to place, happy with each other but starting to hate people more and more as they were rejected again and again.  Finally they came to an island called Sibu.  It was a very nice place with a lovely beach and beautiful stars so they built the perfect home. It had a lovely big room upstairs for the Witch with plenty of room for her bats to hang in the high ceiling and big windows for easy access by broom.  For the Vampire they built a perfect, pitch black tiny room downstairs, as good as any coffin, with an entrance most people could never find.  Well, unless he’d been a bit messy eating and had left a trail of blood. So there they lived, happily ever after…..

UNTIL one day a boat arrived with three men on board.  They had a good look at the land, did a lot of talking, shook hands and then left.  Not long after that two of the men came back with lots of others and started building chalets and heaven knows what all over the Witch and the Vampire’s lovely home.  They even tried making changes to their house but an “accident” soon put a stop to that. The Witch could not have anyone coming up her stairs and so conveniently got her black cat to trip the man down the stairs.  He landed on his head and died instantly.  His friend buried him in the jungle just south of the owner’s house not too far from where they burn the rubbish in fact.  The grave is marked with a tombstone, R.I.P.

After that no one would go near the Witch and Vampire’s house, especially as the cat seemed to live permanently on the stairs!  Eventually the banging and shouting stopped and all but the one man left.  He walked to the front of the property and banged a large sign into the earth and went to bed.  The Witch and the Vampire read the sign, it said “Sea Gypsy Village Resort”.  They looked at each other in horror realizing unless they took action fast their lovely home would be ruined for ever.  That very night the remaining chap put a very large yellow metal tin on his back that had a long pipe going into his mouth.  He put a glass box over his eyes, some long rubber shoes on his feet and, strangest of all, tied some lead weights around his waist.  Taking a very large torch he then walked into the sea and disappeared.  The Witch and the Vampire thought this very strange behaviour until they saw another sign outside one of the chalets, it read ‘Dan’s Nasty Dive Base’.  The Vampire sprang into action, being night time he was free to act.  He instantly turned into a bat, flew over the ocean to look for the diver’s bubbles, dived down into the sea and, once in front of the rather surprised chap, turned from a bat back into a Vampire.   He didn’t have to do anything else, the diver died of fright right there and then and to this day his ghost can be found wandering between the dive base and the house reef.  The Witch and the Vampire were now alone again and could live happily ever after…..

EXCEPT a little time after the two chaps had died a young couple arrived at Sea Gypsy Village.  They brought a lot of supplies and cleaning things and started in earnest to make the rather dirty run down place look respectable again.  The Witch and the Vampire were horrified and knew what they must do in order to have the place to themselves.  That night the Vampire flew as a bat to the biggest of all the chalets in Sea Gypsy Village, where he knew the girl was staying.  He didn’t have to go inside as the beautiful young girl was standing on the balcony in what looked like a wedding dress singing a pretty song and dancing all alone.  The Vampire didn’t stop to listen to any song, turning into human form he grabbed the horrified girl and before she could so much as scream he had drank every ounce of blood in her body.  A little later the young man came to the big chalet and stood beneath the balcony calling to his beloved but the only thing that greeted him was a repulsive Zombie Bride. She beckoned to him and held her arms open wide but, scared out of his wits, the young man ran and ran.  The witch flew after him cackling (which really wasn’t very nice of her, after all he was frightened enough).  The Vampire was meant to catch him and drink all his blood but he was completely stuffed with eight pints of delicious maiden’s blood and simply couldn’t manage another drop.  Truth to tell he was a little bit drunk, he’d been living on gecko, rat and iguana blood for so long he wasn’t used to drinking so much in one go!  Anyway the Witch followed the terrified young man as he stumbled across the property.  He saw some stairs and ran up them, not realising they didn’t actually go anywhere.  Once he got to the top he collapsed, staring at the rock in front of him in horror.  The Witch seized the opportunity to cast a spell and watched as jungle creepers grew instantly and thickly around the feet of the young man, trapping him there as surely as any chains.  Of course he starved to death and now nothing remains of him except a skeleton.   Some weeks later the young couple’s families arrived looking as though they would celebrate a wedding but left sadly as they simply could not find the young couple anywhere.  After that nobody came near Sibu again.  So finally the Witch and the Vampire could live happily ever after…

ON THE OTHER HAND some years went by and they really were very lonely.  The corpse, the ghost, the zombie and the skeleton weren’t much company, even though in time they did all become friends.  So the Witch and the Vampire put an ad in the paper to see if anyone would like to come and run Sea Gypsy Village.  The Wills family applied and have been firm friends with the Witch and the Vampire ever since.  Sea Gypsy Village on Sibu has become a very friendly place for everyone to stay and it’s only on All Hallows Eve that the characters in this story come out to play. 

So finally we really can say THEY ALL LIVED HAPPILY EVER AFTER!