(Originally authored by faith)
There’s an urban legend going around. It jumps from mouth to mouth, changing each time it gets told. To outsiders familiar with this sort of thing, the legend sounds like an odd variation on the Bloody Mary myth. But this one has the sad distinctions of being true.
The story goes something like this (which plenty of details added or changed to suit the teller). Jenny Mcfaddon was the daughter of a poor farmer in a nameless colony raised in the 1600s (a colony occasionally said to be on the very ground the town now rests). The story goes that a group of Jenny’s best friends were caught in a strange ritual and rounded up by the local magistrate. They were asked to confess their sins, and confess they did. They said that Jenny, an easy scapegoat, was a witch. Every night she would dance naked in the fields, singing songs to the devil. She had compelled them night after night, slipping into their dreams and forcing them to perform terrible acts. Sometimes they would awaken, miles from home and not a stitch of clothing on their person. They had all sold their souls at her behest.
The truth was, Jenny was a shy and modest girl, the very Puritan ideal of virtue. On the other hand, her friends had all long ago made pacts with dark things that had been there longer than the Europeans. Jenny, much as they liked her, was far too pious for their circle. So they incensed the town, driving it into a mob. Jenny was seized and a confession demanded. She stated she didn’t know what the magistrate was talking about. Enraged, the town’s people stripped the frightened girl naked and dragged her red faced through the streets. A stockade was hastily thrown together, and Bare Jenny was locked in place in the center of town. For a long, cold week she sat miserably in the stocks. Towns people would stop to taunt, curse, spit out or simply leer at the poor naked girl.
Finally, the magistrate had had enough. He came with a mob, bearing torches, hay, and oil. He demanded a confession. Jenny again refused. He proclaimed that she would then burn for her crimes. They say that as flame touched wood, her friends came forward, smiling and snickering at her fear and embarrassment. They began to join hands and circled the burning fire, the town folk unseeing. As they circled the stockade like a may pole, they began to softly whisper.
“Jenny Jenny, you’re a witch! Jenny Jenny, without a stitch! Jenny Jenny, face so red! Jenny Jenny, now your dead! Jenny Jenny, on the fire, Jenny Jenny, we’re all liars, Jenny Jenny, fare the well, Jenny Jenny, down in hell!”
Jenny, the rumor goes on to say, cursed them as she burned. Forsaking virtue, she promised vengeance on all of them. Of course, its just a story. But they say if you stand in a dark room, staring in a mirror, and softly sing the coven’s little rhyme, Bare Jenny’s ghost will come to you. Why you would want to be haunted by a vengeful, sorrowful spectre is anyone’s guess, but she’ll come all the same, and she’ll haunt you forever.
Occultists refer to poltergeists as ghosts that died under circumstances of intense emotion and traumatic experiences. These spirits are awash in the emotions that overcame them at the moment of death- metaphorically drowning in these feelings until they are an all consuming obsession. Some ghosts can be put to rest if unfinished business is settled or something important to them is destroyed. Jenny, on the other hand, only wants to inflict as much shame and embarrassment on the living as she can. She particularly fixates on young women, because they remind her of the friends who betrayed her. Like many poltergeists, Jenny can move objects with her mind and often manifests as strange or violent noises. By far her favorite technique involves stripping a victim naked and tossing them into situations that will cause the most shame and embarrassment possible. Like the witch she was rumored to be, Jenny can slip into dreams and torment a subject there. She’s also capable of possessing a person outright, and can choose to cause them to black out or be completely aware of their actions but totally unable to stop themselves from being compelled like her puppets. Jenny, unlike some ghosts, doesn’t haunt particular locations- she haunts people. She can follow the one who calls her anywhere, and can torment them at any time. She can also latch on to anyone her summoner knows or meets while Bare Jenny haunts her, so long as that person comes within a few feet of a mirror or falls asleep.
Bare Jenny is a pitable figure, as much a slave to her own emotions and curse as any of her victims. A kind hearted, demure girl (one that reminds Jenny of herself) might hear a soft weeping or an whispered apology moments before her clothes are torn to shreds and she is forcibly exposed to as many people as possible. On the other hand, a spiteful cold hearted woman will feel only cold, hateful vengeance from Jenny. At her calmest, Jenny can seem lucid and even friendly, but this is merely a calm soon to be drowned in a storm of shame and helpless anger.
People say that fire can drive Jenny away temporarily. But when the flames die down or her chosen victim(s) stray into the darkness beyond the fire, she’ll be back and well and truly enraged. There might be a way to permanently destroy or banish her, but if one exists it will have to be discovered by the ones she haunts.
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