A Bridge to Nowhere

Samantha Mills investigates a mystery of Cross Creek, if only to debunk an urban legend.

Beams from headlights slice through the night, capturing flurries of mosquitoes and other nocturnal entities as a car pierces through the gloom. The driver grips the wheel with clammy hands. Fear and regret shake the very core of her being.

Samantha Mills utters to herself in a feverish tremble, “What the hell have I done?” Her jaw stiffens; her nerves pressed. She knows not what entirely compelled her to perform such a stupid act, whether it be mere curiosity or sheer rebellion in the face of those who warned her of the dangers. Admittedly, Samantha had not entirely been herself the past few weeks, but this one really took the cake. Her younger self would have never even challenged such a notion.

Now, here she is, a stranger in a strange land. Worst of all, she doesn’t know how to get back home.

Up ahead the same covered bridge nears, the one she crossed at least a dozen times. The car screeches to a halt. She can only remember what had brought her here, to this hellish state of no return.

It was a simple self-sabotaging dare, that was all it was. Cross the stupid bridge, debunk an urban legend.

Now Samantha is in no man’s land, in the dark, alone, only to have driven circles for well over two hours and still coming back to the same bridge as before.

She has to get out of this enigmatic dilemma; she damn well must.

Tires lurch over the gravel as Samantha guides the car over the bridge once again. Wood creaks and groans under the weight of her car, making her fear at any minute the bridge would fail and cave in, willing her to plunge into the creek below. A small part of her wishes it would, if that was what it would take to get her out of this trap.

Once again, she makes it to the end of the bridge, and a quarter of a mile brings her to a gas station. Maybe she finally made it.

She remembers vividly having filled up at that exact gas station, and having met the locals, spending a good while chronicling accounts of the mysteries surrounding Cross Creek.

That was right before she crossed the cursed, covered bridge for the very first time.

Except, this time, something was entirely off about the gas station. Most of it looked the same. However, the two pumps under the canopy stood as tombstones. The lights were out, the station boarded up. It stood in the dark as a shell of a corpse from some distant past, desolate from every ounce of civilization to be lost and forgotten for all eternity.

She shudders as disbelief strikes her that she could not possibly take what stands in front of her in full reality, that it must be an illusion. As much as she tried to convince herself that it wasn’t possible, the more apparent the realization suggests that she was trapped in some element of time of which she could never escape.

She blames herself; she more so blames her friends. They were the ones who told her about this segment of Vermont, tucked away into the deepest confines of the Appalachian Mountains, as if to scare her. It was a story of three brothers who would entrap wandering tourists, butcher and slaughter them. Rumor had it that those poor victims were buried in a plot on their land. There was no telling how many the plot held. The three brothers were brought to court, but the case was thrown out over a technicality, as inconceivable as it might sound. It had something to do with the brothers being of a family who had very close ties with the legal system.

Samantha scoffed at it as sheer nonsense and was compelled to prove them wrong. She took it upon herself to do extensive research, sifting through countless news articles of the years covering the time of events stretching from August 1952 until February 1958, the time when the brothers’ legacy of terror curiously ended. All leads brought Samantha nowhere. No records of their cases showed up on the criminal registry archives. No obituaries. It all seemed as if it was a figment of some imagination who wanted to weave a yarn in hopes to make an urban legend.

The only prominent evidence that stuck were snippets of the location. Something about Highway 846, particularly the bridge, hung on Samantha’s mind to the point that she felt she needed some explanation if only to debunk the myth. So she took it upon herself to follow the trails that led her to Highway 846 and up to the very gas station in front of which she was now parked. Except, the gas station at the time was completely open and pretty alive. Samantha spent a great deal of time speaking with locals, all who confirmed the account as well as the names of the men in question: Tood, Benjamin and Billy Banks.

The Banks family had been a pretty prominent presence in the community, stretching back to the eighteen-hundreds. The Banks family helped build the town from the very beginning, and were even the pillars of the foundation that founded the province of Cross Creek. It came as a real shock to everyone that such claims were made, because although people were said to have disappeared on the very stretch of Highway 846, beyond the bridge that led to the Banks residence, there was no real evidence to put against the brothers, so there was no case built upon it. More mysteriously, all three brothers vanished without a trace, as if they were completely wiped off the map. Rumors circulated the road beyond the bridge to be haunted, that there were some who crossed the bridge, never to return. The locals even blasted such instances as ghost stories used to intrigue tourists, which only made Samantha even more confused to the point she had to find some light in the case, no matter the cost.

Apparently the price was hefty, for Samantha remains flabbergasted, staring in awe at the dilapidated gas station devoid of any life that only thickened the mystery. A frosty chill prompts her to leave immediately, that something in the establishment was watching her, surveying her every next move.

In reaction, Samantha guides the car around and returns to the cursed bridge, driving once more through the roofed structure where cobwebbed beams hang above her, waiting to fall and crush over her to entrap her in the structure. Only, it didn’t happen. Samantha makes a clear trip to the other end of the creek.

It is to her surprise that some abnormality sticks out in the darkness: a single streetlamp flickers in the gloom. It wasn’t there before, she swears to herself, but there it stands as a beacon in the grim night of desolation.

She passes the post that fades until all light is extinguished behind her in a veil of complete blackness. A part of her wants to weep from the bittersweet departure of hope she cast in the past behind her, but she knows her future lay somewhere in the distance of the isolated road ahead.

Before her, two small orbs form, growing bigger by every waning second, until they manifest to form headlights from another car quickly approaching Samantha. It isn’t until the headlights close enough for Samantha to realize it is driving in her lane. With a jerk of the wheel, Samantha darts the car rightward, crashing through the brush, as a 1955 Studebaker zooms by the peril it created for Samantha without a care in the world.

Samantha’s car rocks and bobs, her hind assaulted by the jerky bumping of her bottom against the interior seating. Her left elbow drums in blunt blows against the armrest of the driver’s side door. She is convinced this is the end for her; for as much as she presses her foot against the pedal, the car gives little resistance, as the car careens against the backdrop of the woods until it ultimately meets its fate to the broad face of a trunk with a finalizing crash!

A car horn blares through the expanse. Steam hisses from a smashed-in radiator. The horn gives.

Nocturnal life of the wilderness sounds to break the silence.

The car door creaks open, out of which Samantha’s body spills and twirls across the foliage in a hollowed thump.

Samantha stares at the cosmic sea of stars and galaxies draped beyond the atmosphere leagues above her, and blinks twice. Head pounding, her face a collage of cuts and bruises, she starts coughing aloud. Gasping for breath, Samantha tries vigorously to regain the oxygen that escaped her from the blow to her larynx. With what little energy remaining, she hoists herself up. Examines her injuries.

A quick review of her body suggests she would have been in a much worse condition had she not fastened her seat belt–a habit her parents drilled into her time and time again, of which she was now quite thankful. Even though her chest and shoulders are dulled with pain, she counts herself blessed that she could at least walk to some degree, and that no bones were broken, no internal damage done.

Samantha’s feet shuffle against the terrain as she limps away from the scene of the accident, not entirely knowing where she was heading, but hopeful she could find some sign of civilization–anyone that could offer some semblance of assistance.

The gnarled branches of bushes rake against her skin as she blindly meanders about the woods in craven distress, tears running down her cheeks in thin rivulets. A million thoughts race through her mind over the hows, wheres and whys, but she knows she needs no distraction to lessen her chances of survival, for anything short of finding help will lead to her ruin, so she pushes through headlessly into the path.

Like a stroke of immense luck borderline of a miracle, another light shines through the breaks in the trees. Her heart hammers fast in hopes that it was not an illusion as she emerges through the end of the woods and comes across a clearing, where within stands a two-storied house. The illumination, she finds, apparently belongs to storm lights shone about the property.

Every light in the house is on, indicative of life resonating within it, and immediately Samantha runs across the lawn in manic excitement, her face beaming.

As her feet land upon the first step to the porch, Samantha stops to a halt. The screen door lurches forward, revealing the outline of a man who speaks almost expectantly, “Hey there. What brings you here all by your lonesome?”

Despite the ample lightning, his face remains shielded in a cloak of shadows. Samantha chokes out, “M-my car… back there… I need help.”

The man remains stolid, unmoved by the revelation, “That is a real shame. What do you want me to do about it?”

“I thought, maybe you can help me get back to town?”

The sounds of crickets chirping and toads belching provides an ambient soundtrack short of a minute before the man responds, “Maybe we can help you with something else.”

“We?” Samantha’s heart murmurs. She steps back and bumps into a hulking figure.

Hands grip her arms firmly in restraint, preventing her from even squirming.

Out from the threshold, steps the man to reveal his identity–more pointedly his face, half of which was shredded to expose a frame of skull and tissue, rotten with gangrene. Its cataracted eyes devoid of life. Another figure comes behind him, this one similar, looking as a walking corpse.

Samantha kicks and screams with all her might as the ghoulish figures pull her into the hellish confines of the home, bent to spend all eternity. The last thing Samantha sees of the world outside is a wooden sign bearing the damning name indented into the frame: Banks.



Prompt: Night-Time

Word Count: 1998