Giant's Teeth

There is a city in California where the dead outnumber the living one thousand to one. It's nestled in the hills outside San Francisco, very easy to miss. White gravestones line the hills as far as the eye can see, like the teeth of countless prehistoric giants, dead and long forgotten. The residents live in the midst of all this, huddled together in the center of town. From every window in every house you can see a dozens graves. They built it that way.

There is a city in California where the dead outnumber the living one thousand to one. It's a quiet town, and you probably won't meet your neighbors. People move in all the time, but they never seem to say for very long. And whenever people move away, they always feel like they have to justify their actions. Too hard a commute. Poor schools. Transferring to a new job. Though eventually they do all come back.

There is a city in California where the dead outnumber the living one thousand to one. It's a painfully dull place, not much to do on the weekends. But you can go for walks between the marble headstones, walks that seem to go on forever. The monuments slip by, one after the other, faster and faster, until they all begin to run together into a blur, and you realize you've seen this one before. You've walked by it a dozen times, but never really stopped to look. And you won't stop to look now either. You won't even slow down.

There is a city in California where the dead outnumber the living one thousand to one. Some people say it's haunted. Few things would be more comforting. Because when you look out your window, you don't see ghosts, or spirits, or shades in the night. You see a cold white stone, a small patch of grass, and if you're lucky a dried out bouquet, crumbling in the wind. You see a fading name on an old rock. And after a while, you don't see anything at all.