The Last Match at Hollow Creek

The town of Hollow Creek had been dead for decades, its bones scattered along the banks of the Yarra River where it twisted through the Gippsland hills. Once a thriving timber town, it now boasted a population of nine, a general store that doubled as a post office, and a cricket ground perched on a plateau above the valley, reachable only by a steep, winding track through ancient eucalypts. The locals spoke of the ground with a reverence reserved for sacred sites, and every summer solstice, they held a match that drew the curious from as far as Melbourne. But newcomers were warned: never spend the night on the plateau before the game, for the ghosts of the old team still wandered, waiting for their chance to play again.

I had come to Hollow Creek to write about the legend, my notebook filled with sketches of the crumbling tombstones that clung to the hillside above the town. The cemetery was a marvel, terraced into the slope, with iron fences and marble angels leaning at gravity-defying angles. Over a thousand souls rested there, their names fading into the lichen. As I climbed the path to the cricket ground, I passed the graves of men who had died in the sawmill accidents, of women who had succumbed to fever, and of children who had never seen their fifth birthday. The air was thick with the smell of damp earth and eucalyptus.

On the eve of the solstice, I met Old Man Kavanagh at the general store. He was the last surviving member of the original Hollow Creek team, a sprightly nonagenarian with a shock of white hair and eyes that held a glint of mischief. ‘You’re planning to camp up there tonight?’ he asked, nodding toward the hill. I nodded. ‘Don’t. The boys are restless this time of year. They come back for the match, you see. We used to camp, my team and I, to get the advantage over the visitors. But now the visitors are the ones who camp, and they never leave.’ He laughed, a dry rattle, and handed me a flask. ‘Drink this before you go. It’ll keep you company.’ I thanked him, but I didn’t drink. I wanted to experience the place as it was.

I pitched my tent at the edge of the ground, the pitch perfectly mowed despite the town’s scant population. The last light of the day painted the valley in shades of gold and copper, and I sat by my campfire, listening to the rustle of possums and the distant call of a currawong. As darkness fell, the temperature dropped, and a mist began to rise from the creek below, creeping up the hillside like a living thing. I felt a chill that had nothing to do with the cold. Then I heard it—the unmistakable sound of a cricket ball striking a bat, followed by the muffled cheers of a crowd. I stood, peering into the murk, but saw nothing. The sounds grew clearer, closer. I could hear the thud of running feet on the pitch, the creak of leather, the murmur of voices speaking in an accent that was distinctly Victorian—the language of the goldfields.

I grabbed my torch and walked toward the sound, but the beam only cut a short, useless cone through the fog. The mist coalesced into shapes—tall, broad-shouldered figures in old-fashioned flannels, their faces blank white. They were playing cricket, their movements fluid and silent. A ball rolled to my feet, and I bent to pick it up, but it was cold, impossibly cold, and it evaporated as I touched it. One of the figures turned and looked at me, and I saw that his eyes were hollow, dark pits. He raised a hand and beckoned. I stumbled backward, my heart hammering, and ran to my tent, where I stayed awake until dawn, huddled in my sleeping bag, the sounds of the ghostly game continuing throughout the night.

The next morning, the sun burned off the mist, and the ground was empty. I packed my gear and descended to the town, where I found Kavanagh sitting on the porch of the general store, nursing a cup of tea. ‘I told you,’ he said, his eyes twinkling. ‘The boys needed a match. You were there as their guest. They’ll be waiting for you again next year. And the year after. Once you’ve been marked, you can never leave Hollow Creek for long.’ He pointed to my hand, and I looked down to see a faint blue mark on my palm, like a bruise from a hard-caught ball. ‘Congratulations,’ he said with a grin. ‘You’re now a member of the Hollow Creek Cricket Club.’ I felt a cold shiver run down my spine, and I knew, with a certainty that chilled me to the bone, that I would return. And that one day, I would not be a spectator, but a player, forever part of the team that never left the plateau.

In the months that followed, I tried to scrub the mark away, but it remained, a permanent reminder of my encounter. I abandoned my book, unable to write about the place in the same way. And every solstice, I find myself drawn back to Hollow Creek, climbing the steep path, setting up my tent, and waiting for the mist to rise. The team is patient. They have all the time in the world. And one day, they will call out my name, and I will take my place on the pitch, and the match will never end.