Cry Baby Bridge

Written by Brenda Wilson

“Are you sure you don’t want me to drive?” Thomas asks from the passenger seat of my uncle’s new Tacoma. 

“Of course, I’d rather you drive. But my uncle said I have to. Something about insurance not covering you,” I say. My uncle’s conditions for letting us borrow his truck were don’t scratch it, no drugs or alcohol, and I have to drive. 

I bite my nails until my mouth tastes like iron and my fingers are sore. “Why are we doing this again?” 

“Mostly to get Jimmy to shut up,” Thomas says with a laugh. He scrolls through his Apple Music to find the perfect “driving thirty minutes away to prove a bridge isn’t haunted” song. He sighs and puts it on shuffle. 

“And if the bridge really is haunted?” I ask. 

“Come on, Babe. You don’t really believe in that stuff, do you? I mean people can’t even agree on which legend is true. Did a mom drown her baby or was there a car accident? Does a baby cry when you go on the bridge with candy or does your car just shake? No one can agree because it’s just a story.” 

I start chewing the inside of my cheek to give my fingers a break and try to focus on the words in the song instead of the rising panic in my chest each time a car passes by. It’s been two years. I should be able to drive on my own now without having panic attacks. That’s what my aunt and uncle keep telling me. I should be fine now. 

“If Jimmy does something stupid can we push him into the creek?” I ask. Of the four of us, Jimmy is the one most likely to go into the forbidden room or read from the cursed text and get us all killed. If I didn’t care about Thomas so much I would just ghost this group. 

“Good luck dealing with Samantha if you do,” replies Thomas. “That girl scares me sometimes. She’s as dumb as a brick but she’s a feisty one.” 

Dealing with her feistiness might be worth seeing the biggest, dumbest jock in school soaking wet and shivering in the October air. Especially if he does something to deserve it. 

“Where did all this fog come from?” Thomas asks as I get off the freeway and head towards the woods. “The forecast said it was going to be sunny. That’s why we chose tonight instead of waiting for Halloween next week.” 

“You can’t trust the weatherman,” I say. It wasn’t supposed to rain on the day of the accident either. Dad thought it would be a good day to drive to the mountains. It was a four-hour drive from Hartselle, Alabama to the Smokey Mountains. The weatherman was wrong then too. 

“Fork ahead,” Thomas says. “It’s hard to see it but you need to go left." 

I could go right where there’s a four-lane road leading into town. But he wants me to go left and head down the road canopied in big trees with weeds on both sides taller than me. I am probably imagining it, but the fog is thicker to the left like a warning sign from God to turn back while we still have a chance. 

“Here goes nothing,” I say. 

“That’s my girl,” says Thomas. He turns up the music and the speakers blast “Sweet Home Alabama” through the foggy woods.

I flinch when Jimmy appears in front of my headlights. “Woo! You’re here!” he screams. 

Behind him, Samantha adjusts the hem of her unseasonal mini-skirt and pops a big bubble in her gum. 

“Damn, I bet Jimmy five bucks that you two turned around. I guess I lost.” 

Thomas laughs and slaps Jimmy on the back. “Aw, I’m glad you had faith in us.” 

“I bet the two of you pulled over to bang!” 

“I guess you both lost,” I say, my voice hardly above a whisper. The real reason we are late is because of me. Driving again wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be. Sure, the driving part was easy. But the anxiety left me with bleeding nails and less cheek skin than I had before. They are lucky I went only a little under the speed limit. 

Jimmy runs to his car and opens the trunk. “Beer anyone?” 

“Hell yeah!” shouts Thomas. “Where did you get these? My fake ID doesn’t work in town. Everyone knows me too well.” 

“Nabbed ‘em from my dad,” Jimmy says with a grin. He pops the top off one and passes it around. I hold up my hand to decline. It was hard enough to drive here sober. I don’t want to attempt it inebriated. 

“Show them what else you got, Babe,” says Samantha. She smiles so wide I’m shocked her gum doesn’t fall out of her mouth. 

“Candy bars!” 

“Why?” I ask. “It isn’t even Halloween yet.” 

“Oh you poor child,” Jimmy says, looking from me to Samantha. She and I couldn’t be more different. Her blonde hair is always curled, her make-up is always caked on, and her tan legs go all the way to her overly plucked eyebrows. Girls like her always date boys like them. I wonder what Thomas sees in me with my five-foot-four, allergic to make-up self. Jimmy must be thinking the same thing because he gives me a funny look before slapping Samantha on the butt and motioning for us all to huddle around him. 

“Legend says, multiple children have died in this very spot. A mother drowned her baby in this lake. Another kid ran away when his mom refused to give him candy for breakfast. Still another boy was kidnapped and when his abductor drove him across this bridge they both poofed into thin air like they never existed at all.” 

I roll my eyes. Thomas opens a beer and downs it in just a few gulps. Samantha is checking how many likes her newest post has on Instagram. 

“I’m insulted,” says Jimmy. “Hailey, you are the only one who even gave eye contact. So you get to do the honors.” He opens a candy bar and passes it to me. 

“What do you want me to do with this?” 

“Go feed the ghosts,” he answers. “My dad said if you bring candy out here you can hear a baby cry.” 

“I’m good,” I say. I’m haunted by my past enough as it is.

Jimmy looks around at each of us individually. Samantha and Thomas shake their heads. No one wants to be the lab rat. 

“Man, y’all are a bunch of chickens,” says Jimmy. “Fine. I’ll do it myself.” He opens another bar and carries them both towards the bridge. 

“Go with him,” Thomas whispers to Samantha. “Come on, don’t let your man go over there alone.” She rolls her eyes and runs over. “I’m coming, Baby.” 

“Can I push them in the creek?” I ask. 

Thomas laughs. “We could go skinny dipping instead?” He pulls me close to him and plants kisses on my neck. I can smell the yeasty beer on his breath. 

“Come on ghosty ghosty ghosty!” screams Jimmy. “I got your candy!” 

“Yeah, come on you big baby!” adds Samantha. 

They walk about halfway down the bridge screaming and yelling through the fog. “Nothing happened,” says Samantha with a big frown plastered across her face. 

“Your turn!” says Jimmy. He is challenging Thomas but staring directly at me. 

“I don’t want to,” I say and shrink behind Thomas. 

“Come on! You didn’t drive all the way out here to be a pansy, did you? Thomas, talk some sense into your lap dog. We walked halfway across, so can you.” 

Thomas offers me a chocolate bar with a raised eyebrow. “What’s the worst that could happen?” 

I refuse the candy bar but take a big swig of his beer and hope the stuff provides a little courage. “Fine. But only halfway. And you better hold my hand.” 

“That’s my girl,” growls Thomas. 

Jimmy and Samantha are sucking face by his car and not paying us any attention. We could pretend we went over and they would never notice. Thomas smiles from ear and to ear and I know, he’s going to make me do this. “Be with me, Mom,” I whisper and take his free hand in mine. 

Together we walk hand-in-hand to the center of the bridge. Minus the fog, it’s just like any other wooden bridge. It creeks in some places and you’ll get a million splinters if you run your hand across it. It isn’t safe for more than one car to drive across at the same time but hardly anyone uses it anymore except hunters and love-struck teenagers with a point to prove. 

“See? Not so bad, right?” he asks. 

The chocolate bar in his hand grows smaller and smaller. I rub my eyes. I’m imagining things. 

“Want to see if we can make it all the way to the other side?” asks Thomas. “That’ll shut Jimmy up for good. He only made it halfway.” 

I can’t stop staring at the shrinking candy bar. 

“Hailey? You OK?” 

I snap out of it and nod my head. He takes that as permission to walk to the other side. A few more steps forward and I feel his hand slip from mine. 

“Thomas?” I ask. The fog has grown thicker and I can no longer see my feet. “Thomas!” 

“Give me back my baby!” a voice screams in my ear. The shrill sound sends shivers down my spine. I reach out to where Thomas is standing and grab his cold hand, yanking him behind me. We run until we are off the bridge. I bend over to catch my breath. 

“Never again,” I tell Thomas. Only when I look up, Thomas isn’t there. I thought I was holding his hand. But maybe I wasn’t. There’s no sign of Jimmy or Samantha either. 

“Guys?” I ask. My heart is pounding a million miles an hour inside my chest. 

“Give me my baby!” the woman shouts. She is four inches from my face now. Her face is paper white and her hair is flowing out behind her. 

“I don’t…have your…baby,” I stammer. 

“Liar!” she screams and grabs for my throat at the same moment I trip over a shoe on the ground. I recognize it as Jimmy’s lucky basketball shoe. The one he wears all year and refuses to ever take off. There’s no time to wonder how it got there because the woman is coming for me again. 

“Thomas! Jimmy! Samantha!” I scream as I run for the truck. I slam the door shut and I can hear the sound of scratching metal as she tries to claw her way inside. 

“I don’t have your baby!” I scream again. I put the truck in drive and zoom over to the bridge. The woman keeps up with me. It’s as if she can fly. I’m going too fast. I don’t see him until he’s flat against the windshield. Thomas. 

“Shit! Thomas!” I scream. I can’t tell if he’s moving. And I can hear her behind me. 

“I’m sorry,” I whisper to Thomas as I put the car in reverse and try to back off of the bridge. But she’s behind the truck now. I slam on the gas pedal and the truck goes right through her as easy as mist. 

“I’m OK,” I tell myself. “Just a tiny bit farther and I’ll be off the bridge.” 

“I miss you,” says my mother. “It’s time to come home, Hailey.” The shock of hearing her voice causes me to yank on the steering wheel. The truck slams into the side of the bridge. The woman is in front of the window now but I don’t care about her anymore. My mother is in the passenger seat beside me in the same clothes she wore on the last trip we ever took together. 

“Mom?” 

She reaches out to smooth my hair. Her touch feels so real. I can even smell her rose-scented perfume. “Come home, Hailey. Your father and I miss you.” 

“I can’t go home. You’re gone,” I choke. 

“You can come home,” she says and points to the guardrail the truck is kissing. “You know how to get there.”

I don’t think. I just act. I thrust my foot into the gas pedal until it is flush to the floor and aim straight for the rail. 

“Welcome home,” says my mother as we crash into the creek.