The Lantern Keeper’s Vigil

I live in the converted lighthouse keeper’s cottage on the edge of the salt marshes, a relic from when the coast was a bustling shipping route. The squat, whitewashed building is a maze of renovations, and my private quarters—a former storage room—has been repurposed into a small apartment with a tiny kitchenette. My hours are odd; I work the night shift at the local cannery, and I often find myself awake long after the town has gone to sleep.

It started a few weeks after I finished reading a book on maritime folklore, tales of the drowned and the lights that lead them astray. One night, I woke to the glow of a full moon painting my room silver. I rolled over, expecting the familiar view of my window, but instead, a figure stood by the kitchenette, silhouetted against the pale curtains. A woman, her hair long and dripping, as if she had just surfaced from the sea. She stood sideways, her face turned toward the window, and she was holding a lantern—the old kind, with a flame that flickered blue. I blinked, and she was gone. I lay there, heart pounding, convincing myself it was a trick of the light or a dream. But I couldn’t shake the image.

Weeks passed. I told myself I was exhausted, that the constant hum of the cannery had done something to my mind. But then my sister, Elin, came to stay for a week. She’s younger, still in school, and she’d always loved the cottage’s eerie charm. On her second night, she burst into my room at 3 a.m., pale. She described the same woman, but in my room, not hers. She said the woman was standing over my bed, staring down at me, and that the lantern had gone out. I didn’t tell her I hadn’t seen the woman in weeks. Instead, we both lay awake, listening to the wind outside.

I began to notice patterns. The woman would appear only when the moon was full, and each time, she was closer to the bed. The first time, she was at the kitchen. Then in the doorway. Then at the foot of the bed. Elin’s visit marked the third time. I started leaving the lantern in the window—a modern one, battery-powered, on a timer—but it never seemed to help. I did some research at the local library, digging through old newspapers. I found a story from 1892: a keeper’s wife had drowned herself in the marsh, after her husband vanished at sea. They never found her body. The lantern she carried was said to be the one she used to guide her husband back, but it had failed.

The fourth occurrence, I was ready. I had set up a camera in the corner of my room, pointing at the bed. When the moon rose, I saw her again, but this time, she didn’t stop at the foot of the bed. She walked through the bed, toward me, and the lantern’s flame grew brighter. She reached out, and I felt a cold, wet hand on my chest. The camera, I later found, captured nothing but a white blur. I showed Elin, and she turned white, whispering, ‘She’s trying to take you with her.’

I can’t sleep now. Every night, I watch the window, and the marsh, and the path to the old lighthouse—now a museum, decommissioned. Last night, I saw her again, but this time, she wasn’t in my room. She was out in the marsh, walking toward the lighthouse, and the lantern was lit. I followed her, against every instinct. The mud sucked at my boots, and the reeds whispered in the wind. She led me to the base of the lighthouse, where the door had been sealed for decades. It was open. Inside, the spiral stairs rose into darkness. I heard her voice, like the hiss of waves: ‘He’s out there. He’s coming back. I need to guide him.’

I found a journal in the keeper’s office, rotting on the desk. It told the story from his perspective: how his wife, lost in grief after their child died, began seeing a light in the marsh, and one night, she walked out with the lantern to meet it. He tried to stop her, but she slipped away. He never found her. He wrote, ‘She’s still out there. She’s still calling.’

Now I know why she appears to me. I’m the new keeper in a way—I’ve taken on the same role, watching over the marsh, the lighthouse. She’s been waiting for someone to take her place. Last night, I saw her at the foot of my bed again, but this time, she held out the lantern. I heard the clank of a boat on the water, out where the marsh meets the sea. I didn’t take the lantern. I couldn’t. But I know she’ll keep coming back, each full moon, closer, until I either give in or join her in the marsh. And the worst part? My sister Elin told me that when she saw me last, I was humming a tune—an old sea shanty from the journal—and my hair was dripping wet.