NoSleep SubReddits

The Figure at the Side of the Road.

Credits: Username- DarklyGathers  

Note: This is one of my personal favorites, I just love it so much

I work at a pub about fifteen miles from my home.

I often get off work late, like 1, or sometimes even 2 am, and then have to make an exhausted, lonely drive back to the house in the dark.

It's been taking me a little longer than usual these past couple of weeks, as works on the main road have forced me to use a long and winding alternative route through the forest, and I hate it.

A dark, creepy forest in the middle of the night. All alone in my car. I had a nightmare not long ago about the car breaking down between the shadows of the pines, and I'm embarrassed to say that it really knocked my confidence.

...But whatever. It's not like I have a choice.

Almost every night I make this drive back.

I leave the main road behind and I wind my way through the hills, and then, the forest.

The branches overhang the road. Like ancient, twisted arms they reach out for me as I pass beneath and between. Reaching out for me in the dark.

There's this one corner in particular that just sends my heart racing, every single damned time.

It's steep as fuck, and I have to slow the car right down to prevent myself from driving directly into the bushes at the roadside. Around it winds in a quick, brutal curve, and then there's a long, sinister straight, one in which you cannot see exactly where it ends, even with the vehicle's lights on full beam. It takes a while, but at the end of this straight is another winding turn, somewhat similar to the first... and it's only then that I can actually start breathing normally again, as it's here that the forest begins to thin out and the hills recede before the road joins up with a more widely-used section of road.

At that first steep turning there's a very small clearing; a section of long grass where the bushes don't quite meet, and on one terrible night as I rounded the corner, the lights of my car were reflected back at me from the glowing eyes of a hare, sat patiently and seemingly waiting for my arrival.

I just about jumped out of my skin. I remember this gasp of dismay rising up from my throat as I slammed the brakes... Not sure why I did that. Instinctive, I guess, but the hare didn't even move. Didn't even twitch. Once I'd calmed myself and started moving again, the hare just sat and watched. Perfectly still...

...Except for its head, that is.

Its head turned with the movement of the vehicle, following the car with its eyes til the creature disappeared from view.

"What the fuck was that?" I'd muttered to myself as the road straightened out. "Animals sure are weird at this time of night". I'd laughed awkwardly, the sound hollow and forced in the isolation of the car.

The air-con crackled, and I cleared my throat. The engine rumbled softly in the night.

*

I'm driving home now, actually. Listening to that same soft rumbling.

Entering into the forest with my jaw set. Frustrated at the repetitive nature of this fear.

"When are they gonna fix the fucking main road, already?" I murmured to myself as I left the lamp-lit road behind me, turning off and passing my way between the hills, the ferns and the trees rising gradually up and all around.

It's a windy one tonight, and the branches sigh in quiet expectation as I pass beneath them, entering deeper into this forest. As a trespasser, almost. That's how it feels.