The Road Novels & Stories

It was still early, yet why were there hardly any vehicles on this road? “Whoa! This place is creepy,” Ryan said, hugging himself like a child. She couldn’t tell whether he was joking or not. She only shook her head and rolled her eyes at him. She pulled her phone out of her handbag and frowned at the signal bars. “Why is there no signal?” she blurted out. “What kind of place is this?!” “We’re in a road development area,” Ryan replied. “What?” she asked in surprise. “This is a shortcut, that’s why I took this route. I just didn’t expect the car to overheat—and for the rain to pour like this,” he explained, which only fueled her irritation.

There’s nothing marking it – nothing mystical or magical about it but…it’s almost as if someone really did clear a path here so that a car just this size could squeeze through… “Okay,” Cora says, laughing a little hysterically. “I think I get it now…” “Look!” I shout, pointing forward to where, after a few minutes of driving, I start to see…asphalt? Something black stretching out before us. “Cora, is that a road?” “I think so,” she says, hope blooming in her voice. But just as the little road is starting to become clear before us, something slams into the car, making us scream in shock and surprise as we fishtail sideways and the back corner of the car slams into a tree.

It won’t take long but I have to pass the main road. “Main road?” I exclaimed on my own. My eyes widened when I checked that the main road is the only road to the Mathews’ bungalow. Today, bad incidents are happening one after the other. The road leading to the Mathews’ bungalow is big and wide. I mean to say that there are a lot of traffic jams. The road is mostly used by busy people, you guys must know, businessmen. Now the time is two in the afternoon, which means there will be no traffic jams. This is a matter of happiness. I am happy now.

*Rob* After years in the military, I consider myself comfortable with GPS and getting around in new places. But following the GPS directions to the Hammond farm, even coming from a place as small as the college community around St. Mary’s, I feel like I’m navigating every rat run and Bob’s Road in the county. In the stretch of about a mile, I’m certain I’ve passed the entirety of the town. The endless acres of snow-dusted fields along either side of this graveled road I’m driving are starting to make me worried I’ve missed it when suddenly a building drifts out of the gloom up ahead and to my left.