Fifteen-year-old Marty Cadence stood outside a dimly-lit store at nine o’clock at night on the rough side of town. His breath moved tirelessly from his mouth and dissipated into the air as a train loudly blared by on rusty tracks. Watching closely, a car drove by on the road, creeping cautiously as if looking for something in the dark – the driver’s face was hard to see, but yellow-white eyes stood out.
The boy blinked and wondered if this was the start of a murder episode on television. Picking up his bike, he pedaled down the sidewalk and around the corner. The wheels clicked as he rode toward the bridge; the stony arch that, in the daytime, took so many passengers out of harm’s way.
“A bridge over troubled water,” he thought.
The black, murky waters beneath the bridge looked as though they would rise up sharply and dangerously at times. Stupidly, childish fear plunged into Marty’s stomach like a dagger twisting in his guts. He had taken many late bike rides, and it was not often that he was scared to be out in the night; however, on lonely winter nights like this, it almost seemed set for terror. So, he rode faster with home in his head – a few uneasy turns and he would be free – but the bridge still lay in his way.
Trying not to think about it, he pedaled with his head down. The menacing feeling came back to him, and his eyes found their way to the bridge. The bicycle clicked even faster, echoing off the stone buildings that surrounded him. He felt alone – once, there had been a man driving in a car, but nothing anymore—he was alone.
A bar light flickered, and a convenience store glowed with electric intensity, but no one was home. No one could be home. The isolation of the night was steadfast in Marty’s brain, and he began to sweat both from pedaling harder and from a malignant fear in his chest. Huffing, he looked and saw the two stone pillars that faced each other on opposite sides of the road again. They were the beginnings of the low stone wall on either side of the bridge. The saving grace against troubled water.
As if hit by a forcefield, after riding to the pillars, he heard the sound and stopped. At first, it was a low ripping sound, like a shirt being torn apart. He continued to freeze, listening for anything that would scare him too much to remain in one place. Leaning closer, he heard a rustling and shifting from the underside of the bridge; now the real fear had set into him.
He knew this would happen, and he had seen it a thousand times and said he would never stoop so low. The terror from around a corner appears—a masked man, a killer clown, a dark figure—and whoever sees them just stops. They never run. They never scream. They just sit there like a deer in headlights.
When he was a child, Marty remembered a story that his mother read to him, a story that terrified him the first time he heard it. “The Three Billy Goats Gruff” (come here, Mr. Goat). Marty knew something was underneath the bridge. (I want to tell you about the green grass, Mr. Goat.) He could see it in his imagination – the great bloated thing – writhing slowly under the bridge. (I want.) Its body moving and – (I want to.) Its mouth opening and – (Eat.)
How strange it was, Marty’s curiosity lingered somewhere down in the recesses of his body. What was he thinking? He was just like everybody else. A deer caught in the headlights. A goat caught by a hungry troll. “I don’t want to check it out, do I?” (Yeah, you do, Mr. Goat.) His palms were damp now, and an awful feeling had acquired itself. He realized that the fear of finding something would traumatize him for the rest of his life—anybody would be traumatized by that, in fact; yet, which was worse, the knowing or the unknowing? What if he was still lying in bed fifty years from now, trying his hardest to imagine what it could have been?
Of course, it would just be a story, and he would be alive, but would that allow him to rest? Marty was terrible under pressure, and the bad ideas always seemed to win out in his head. His curiosity got the better of him.
Setting his bike down next to one of the stone pillars, he began to work his way through the broken fence and down to the – (eating) noise (don’t fool yourself kid, you know what it is). He parted the chain-link fence easily and descended the gravelly slope to the vacant area near the underbelly of the bridge. Most of the grass was dead at the bottom—matted down and partially covered with darkened clumps of snow. The moon echoed silvery light and reflected its pressing beams on the thumping black shore. The water churned and churned.
Across the river, Marty could make out the sleeping factories. They were nice buildings by day, but at night, they were tall and haunting like the black waters of the river. Along the shore, there were small wooden posts that remained from an older time, but now they protruded like ugly teeth, yellow and tarnished, joining each other rusted, chain-link arms.
He saw something else out of the corner of his eye, laying in the dark. His stomach flopped, but he reasoned with himself, it was only coincidence. There, against the wall, was another bicycle; it was red like his but empty of a rider. Shaking the fear away once more, intrigue grabbed him by the throat: he wanted to see the underside of the bridge. Peering into the underbelly where it was only darkness and shadow, he could make out no definite shape—not even the moon’s insistent rays could pierce its blackness.
Still apparent but louder, the ripping noise echoed grotesquely to his ears. Heart racing, he strained hard to see anything at all, even going so far as to cup his hands around his brow as if staring through the sun. He couldn’t believe he had brought himself this far, and suddenly, he felt stupid for doing such a trivial thing. While he contemplated his stupidity, the horror that he expected fell out from the underside of the bridge in a quick motion, not even surprising Marty with its suddenness. It was a simple hat, as though it had fallen out from the night.
Twisting in the air, twirling for a moment, and then settling down in front of him.
In the darkness, there was a low chuckle, and Marty looked up. Silvery eyes met him.
“I don’t have any more room,” a gravelly voice said. “If you leave now, I don’t think I will have the stomach for you.”
The voice coughed and chuckled again, reaching out a blackened and dirty hand to pull the hat into the shadows.
Marty’s eyes, comically wide, turned with his body, and he began to run up the hill toward the street. His feet flew quickly, and he was nearly to the top, running to save his own life. The chilly night air whipped his face, and although he ran faster than he had ever run, the sheer magnitude of the moment made his feet feel like they were stuck in quicksand, each step was a heave, and each burst of speed a lurch. He needed to run faster, but he knew this dream all too well. He would be running forever, each shoe stuck to the ground as if it were fixed with glue and tape.
Regardless of what the voice had said, he could feel something following him. (I got you, Mr. Goat.) Nearly leaping, he got onto his bike and rode off. He only looked back once, seizing a sight more terrible than the bloody hand. Hollering out in madness, he rode faster still, eyes running with tears and heart nearly bursting. When he got home, he bolted across the front lawn and flung the front door open. He slammed it behind him and locked it safely, running to his bedroom, where yet again he locked his bedroom door, turned, and fell to his bed.
Aimlessly, he opened the blinds to his window and looked upon the river. (He had turned and looked back.) The water ran black and cruel underneath the bridge. (and saw somebody…something) The waves ascended higher in the late winter months. He lay awake in bed, with the light from the moon splashing in from his window, and the sound of the river only moments away. (monster? beast? creature? deranged man?) He had seen it. It had been doing something underneath the bridge: tearing, ripping, eating. A person maybe. A person probably. A person certainly. Another boy out for a night ride. In that final moment of terror, why had he looked back? That gruesome thing was standing by the fence: watching, looking, plotting – (hungry) It was crouched—disgusting by the streetlight—and its eyes were piercing silver. It had a horrifying mane of black hair on its head, and its hands were beset by razor-sharp claws. Marty thought about how it was still waiting for him. For the next night rider to be out and carelessly enter its domain.
