The Bridge

Clara dropped her bag on the coffee table in the café and flopped down in her favorite wing back chair nearest to the rear wall. She didn’t go to work today. She didn’t even call in to tell her boss she wouldn’t be there. This was not something she would normally do, but today, she didn’t care. Would her boss be mad? Probably not. He barely noticed her presence at all until a deadline approached. She was exhausted by her workload and was not the least bit sorry for her absence. 

Gazing outside the window of the shop, she could see the light of the day was fading. It was pretty late to be in a coffee shop, and there were few people to be seen. She liked it this way. Her daily life was so chaotic that the peace was welcome. The only sound was the intermittent whirring of the espresso machine and the quiet murmur of a couple spotty conversations. 

She took a big breath in and followed it up with a long sigh. Her coffee was still too hot to drink, so she would take a minute to just... sit for once. 

She sat with her eyes closed and inadvertently overheard a conversation taking place between two college age kids who had just sat down on the sofa to her left.  

“Corey never came back to class. He’s still missing.” 

“Where was he before?” 

“Jake said he was talking about heading to Bulldog Bridge the day before he went missing.” 

“That old bridge out near Wheeling? But why?” 

Clara felt her ears perk up, but she tried her best to stare out the window and act like she wasn’t listening to their conversation. The two kids continued talking. 

“You’ve heard the old stories, it’s haunted or whatever. All those people died out there. People going missing, too. Something like six over the course of a decade or so? You know he’s into that spooky shit, but he’s probably just laying low. You know how stressed he’s been.” 

“Yeah, I’d be tired as hell if I had to work two jobs to put myself through school too. Well, if he doesn’t show back up soon, he’s going to miss the beginning of fall term.” 

“Have you ever been out there?”’ 

“Yeah, a couple times. It’s really no big deal. Kids from town head out there to drink because there’s virtually no traffic.” 

Their conversation droned on into other topics and the two kids eventually got up and left the café. 

Clara pulled her tablet from her bag and Googled “Bulldog Bridge.” She had to scroll a bit, but finally got some relevant hits. Stories about people going missing, ghost sightings, ghost lights, mysterious deaths. As she scrolled through the results, she decided this would be her Friday night adventure. It was a weeknight, so the likelihood of running into a group of people was slim.  

Years ago, she had been part of a local paranormal investigation group. The members all went their separate ways for many different reasons, one by one. Clara missed the thrill so much, so why not just go out and have a little investigation of her own? It would be quiet if nothing else.  

She finished her coffee and headed to her car as the very last of the daylight left the sky.  

*** 

The coordinates she had gotten from one of the websites led her to a familiar part of the countryside. Her parents lived near here, probably just a few miles up the main road she had just turned from. She wondered how she had never heard of this haunted place with it being so close to where she grew up. 

She turned down a long, straight road and could see a tree line ahead. As she approached, the bridge became visible. It was pretty unassuming from what she could see in her headlights: small, concrete and steel, completely open. She parked her car on the gravel shoulder near the edge of the bridge and turned off the engine. Then the lights.  

As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she could see the tree line covered both sides of the ditch, which continued on along the ditch in both directions, as far as she could see. She grabbed her flashlight, slung her bag over her shoulder, and got out of the car. She didn’t immediately turn on the flashlight because she didn’t want to draw any attention to herself should anyone else be nearby. But then she saw something all over the light-colored concrete of the bridge, so she switched it on anyway. 

The flashlight revealed that the bridge was entirely covered in graffiti. The road, the sides, all of it. Most of it looked like nonsense tags put there by kids out there on a dare. There was barely an empty space anywhere. She noticed a couple of strange markings that weren’t your typical names, initials, or renderings of genitalia one usually sees in sloppy amateur graffiti. These looked like sigils. She had seen sigils before in her paranormal investigations, but without knowing the person who made these clearly custom sigils, it was impossible to know what they were used for.  

Now that she was on the bridge, she could hear and see a very robust stream flowing through the wide ditch. She walked to the edge of the bridge and looked over the side to get a better look.  The black water swirled and bubbled around the rocks below the bridge as the beam from her flashlight danced over it. She switched off the light and stood in the darkness. 

After taking another moment to allow her eyes to adjust, she could see that the trees along the trees were full of fireflies. So many of them. Their lights were flashing in a pattern, and she noticed that it mimicked a heartbeat. The lights were also reflected in the water of the stream. This sight coupled with the sound of the stream was incredibly relaxing. She suddenly wanted to get off the bridge and get closer to the bank of the stream. She walked back and around the guardrail and carefully headed down the embankment towards the water. 

When she got to the bottom, she saw there was a perfect rock at the edge of the stream for her to sit on, and so she did. She looked up at the trees as they glowed above her. It was like her own personal light show and she felt like she could sit there forever in that warm late summer air.  

The insects around her suddenly fell silent. For a moment, she thought she had gone deaf because the ceasing was so abrupt. The trickle of the stream and her breathing were the only sounds remaining. An uneasy feeling washed over her, but she did not get up. She carefully reached into her bag that was still slung over her shoulder and produced a small electronic voice recorder, switched it on, and hit the record button. Then she asked the typical EVP prompt: 

“Is there anyone here with me right now?”  

She paused after the question per standard procedure. Before she could ask another question, she heard a splashing in the water. Switching off the recorder, she frantically grabbed her flashlight. It wouldn’t turn on. It became clear that the water in front of her was swirling around, illuminated only by the lightning bugs that were still flashing rhythmically above her. She could feel her heart racing in her chest, but she still didn’t run away. She only sat quietly watching. 

The water continued to swirl until it produced a whirlpool, and it continued to widen. The stream did not seem very deep, but she could not see any bottom to the whirlpool. She dropped her bad and recorder, and finally stood up to get a better look. When she did, she was immediately pulled forward into the whirlpool. She reached out frantically trying to grasp onto something as she fell, her hands grazing the sides of the seemingly bottomless hole. She watched as the firefly-illuminated trees faded and then disappeared as the mouth of the swirling vortex closed above her. She continued to fall, now in the pitch darkness, and wondered when she would be obliterated on the ground at the bottom. She accepted that this might be the end and closed her eyes and waited for death to find her. 

She suddenly didn’t hear the water anymore and the sensation of stillness came over her. She opened her eyes and saw that she was lying in dim, warmly lit room. She sat up quickly, and immediately regretted it. Her head was swimming, and she needed a moment to find her bearings.  

When she was finally able to see her surroundings, she saw she was sitting on a couch upholstered with red brocade and the walls were lined with rich wood paneling and bookshelves. The warm light was coming from a fireplace on the other side of the room. For a moment, she wondered if she had died and gone to heaven. This was like places she had only seen in her dreams. The smell of hot coffee reached her nose, and she noticed a carafe, fresh fruit, and some pastries on a long table pushed up against the wall. There was even lemon cake, her favorite. She looked around and didn’t see anyone to object, so she helped herself and sat down in a chair near the fireplace.  

The room was warm, quiet, and had all her simple wants and needs covered. She didn’t need much. There were more books than she could ever read. Plenty to eat, and even though she had just taken a slice of lemon cake from the table, there was more there already. She hadn’t seen anyone come in, but also was not too worried about it.  

“I could stay here forever” she thought, and grabbed a book from the shelf. She opened it, took a sip of coffee, and began to read. 

** 

“We’ve got something over here” the radio on Sgt Thomas’ shoulder crackled. 

He looked up and saw his deputy waving him over. As he made his way over through the brush at the side of the creek, what his Deputy found was pretty apparent. The smell hit him hard and was far too familiar. There was the woman who had gone missing weeks ago, slumped over on a large rock. Her bag still at her side and a recorder in her hand. It looked as if she had sat down, fell asleep, and never woke up.  

Sgt Thomas looked sadly down at the sight and thought “Not again.” He carefully pulled the recorder from her hand and hit play.  

He could hear Clara’s voice asking, “Is there anyone here with me right now?” followed by a short pause... and then a response. 

“You belong here” said a quiet, whispery, raspy voice. 

Then static and silence.  

Sgt Thomas looked up at his Deputy, his heart in his throat.  

“Call the coroner. When the papers ask, tell them no foul play is suspected. We don’t need to draw more attention this place.”