Blind Pickle Man

When I bought my house I learned the previous owners had rented the second floor apartment to an old blind man. He answered an ad they were about to put in the newspaper. That’s right. They claimed he came to inquire about the apartment before it had even run in the paper. They thought he was strange but he produced the needed deposit and two months rent in advance so they allowed him to move in.

They told me that the old man never went outside and that no one ever came in, that he didn’t receive Christmas cards, or groceries, subscribe to cable or use any electricity. In fact, after the first day they rented to him he never made another appearance outside the confines of his dwelling. Mysteriously though, on the first of every month his rent check would appear on their kitchen counter in an empty one gallon pickle jar. The owners would always take the check out and sniff it and indeed it would smell like a dill pickle.

Some years later, on the first of the month, the owners awoke and went to kitchen expecting to find the pickle jar with the usual rent check inside but were disturbed to find a plunger instead. The owners thought this some kind of cruel joke and so opened the upstairs apartment, and yelled up the stairs, “This isn’t funny!”

From the upstairs apartment, coming from the bathroom, they heard a muffled, “Help.”

Quickly scaling the stares they rushed into the upstairs apartment, which was fille with empty pickle jars. They heard “help” again and it seemed to be coming from the bathroom so they rushed in. The husband tore open the shower curtain and once again they heard “help” and it seemed to be coming from the shower drain.

“Did you hear that?” the wife asked.

“It sounded like it was coming from the drain,” the husband said.

“Well, plunge it,” the wife said.

“Okay,” the husband said and began plunging.

There was a loud burping noise and the smell of dill pickles wafted up. The husband pulled up the plunger and there was a pickle stuck in the bottom of it. Pickle juice bubbled up from the shower drain.

“What the Hell?” the husband asked, turning the pickle over in his palm.

“Help,” they heard from the shower drain again.

The husband again began to plunge and soon he sucked up another pickle and more pickle juice filled the tub and then they heard “help” again. The wife placed the pickles into jars and scooped the juice up with other empty jars. This process went on all day and all night long and still they heard “help” coming from the shower drain.

After two days of plunging and filling pickle jars with juice and pickles, when all the pickle jars were filled they no longer heard anyone calling for help from the drain. They never saw the old blind man again.

I didn’t believe the story and bought the house.

This morning I was digging in the garden out back when I hit something hard with my shovel. I brushed away the dirt and there was a full one gallon pickle jar. The pickles inside looked fresh enough so I took one out and bit into it. “Help,” I heard and looked down saw that there were more pickle jars in the garden. I began to dig with my hands and soon found that there were thousands of jars of pickles under the garden, stack neatly in a pyramid. As I removed the top layer of pickle jars a magnificent light shown from between the cracks. Hastily I removed more of the pickle jars and when they were all gone I saw something very odd. There was a giant pickle jar in the center of the pickle jar pyramid and there was an old man inside this giant pickle jar floating like an embryo in umbilical fluid. He was wearing very dark glasses and clutching a long white cane.

“Help,” he said.