They said the road was cursed, but I didn’t believe it until my car refused to turn back.
At first, I thought the steering was just stuck. Mud, maybe. But when the wheel locked in place and the headlights dimmed, I felt it. The car wanted to go forward. The air grew thick and heavy, as if I were driving underwater. My phone had no signal, the GPS was glitching out, and the radio only emitted static.
The trees pressed closer with every turn of the tires, their branches scraping the sides of the car like fingernails. Then, through the fog, I saw it, an old wooden sign, rotted and hanging sideways:
Briar Hollow Road – Do Not Enter.
My chest tightened. I’d heard of it before; people said no one ever made it out once they drove too far. I tried to hit the brakes, but the pedal sank to the floor with no resistance.
Then I saw her.
A woman standing in the middle of the road, wearing a soaked white dress, her hair clinging to her face. My headlights flickered, and for a split second, I could swear she was smiling.
“Get out,” a voice whispered from the passenger seat.
I turned, but no one was there. When I looked back, the woman was gone.
The radio crackled to life. A child’s voice came through, broken and distant:
“Lena… you shouldn’t have come.”
My name caught in my throat. I hadn’t told anyone where I was going.
The car jerked violently forward. The engine screamed. The road ahead vanished into fog, but the woman appeared again, this time right in front of the hood, her eyes black and hollow.
I slammed the wheel, but the car didn’t move. The doors locked themselves. And just before the lights went out completely, she leaned against the glass and whispered,
“Now you’ll stay with me.”
They found the car a week later, empty, engine still running, headlights pointing down an endless road that wasn’t on any map.