Detour

 On a dark, dusty, lonely highway, Sam took a wrong turn on the detour. She hadn’t seen anyone for miles and the sun was setting fast. The thick trees that lined the road was choking out most of the daylight. A loud sound of bubble wrap being popped under the car startled her and the vehicle started to veer off the left. Sam slowed down to a stop to see what had happened.

“Great a flat,” Sam rolled here eyes. She pulled out her cell phone to call for assistance. “No cell service either.”

In the trunk of her car Sam had a spare bag in case of emergencies and the donut in case of a flat. Feeling great about getting the tire on without a problem, she let the jack down and discovered the donut was flat. She grabbed her emergency bag and began to walk holding her cell phone out in hopes of picking up a signal.

The sun had completely set by the time Sam got a mile down the road. She scanned the area with her flashlight and decided to take a narrow road down to a house with the moonlight at her back. She almost didn’t see the house, half hidden from overgrown hedges that hadn’t seen a pair of sheers in decades and a fence that was in the midst of falling over. The smell of dead leaves and a hint of rain was carried in the breeze.

Sam almost turned around when a bad feeling hit her like someone watched her approach the front steps. She pulled her coat closer to her and picked up her pace. The steps were unstable and creaked with every step. She looked through the cracked window, leaves and dust covered the floor with no sign of life. When she entered the house the handle of the door fell off in her hand. The first room had a rickety rocking chair in the corner by a fireplace, the ceiling was covered in cobwebs, and the paint had started to peel off of the walls. In the kitchen some of the cabinet doors were missing as well as the stove and refrigerator. She turned on the faucet in the grime coated sink just to see if it would work. It did! She flicked the light switches on and off but no avail they would not work. The bathroom had a small stand up shower, toilet, and a cracked sink. The last room of the house was a bedroom. Curtains hung torn and dirty from the window, a dirty mattress sat upon a rusty bed frame, and at the foot of the bed lay a trunk. Sam opened it and found a blanket and a small pillow.

“I guess it was meant to be that I stay here tonight,” Sam held up the blanket. The wind became gusty, she checked her cell one more time for service and settled in for the night. The house moaned in the wind, it felt as if the house was crying out.

Sam slept and dreamed that she lived in the house when it was in its heyday. The white fence was standing tall and there were no broken or cracked windows. She was in the backyard enjoying the warmth of the sun and breathing in the sweet smell of the flowers that grew in the yard when she heard a commotion coming from the house. Next she knew she was standing in the kitchen watching a tall man holding a knife towering over a woman. She was begging for her life. Blood dripped down her arm from a gash on her shoulder. The man stabbed her in the gut, the woman tried to run but the man grabbed her hair and pulled her close to him. In one steady movement the man slashed the woman’s throat ear to ear. Blood sprayed out and she collapsed to the floor lifeless. The man vanished. Sam ran over to the body and screamed when she turned to woman over.

Sam had woke herself up when she screamed. She convinced herself it was only a dream and took the flashlight out to the room where the lady had laid in a pool of blood. Not seeing anything on the dirty floor she went back to the room.

Scratch, scratch. Sam looked towards the closet. Knock, knock. Taking her flashlight Sam walked to the closet and leaned close to the wall. “Help,” a muffled voice whispered. Sam started to pull at the peeling paint and pounded on the drywall to create a hole. She started to pull away the wall when she felt a cold hand on her lower back. Hair stood up on the back of her neck as Sam spun around to see who was there. A flash of a mans face before her eyes.

“Leave me alone,” Sam shouted.

Something fell behind the wall. Sam shinned the light in the hole to see what had made the sound and she seen a skeleton. The temperature dropped dramatically, she could see her breath. A voice whispered in her ear, “Get out.” Her flashlight flickered and died.

Sam had ran out of the house so fast she almost tripped. Thunder filled the sky and the rain pelted down. Drenched, breathless, and freaked out Sam locked herself in her car. No cell service, flat tire, and rain coming down in sheets, She didn’t think she would survive the night.

In the early morning light Sam just about jumped out of her skin to a light rapping on her window. “Hello,” a mans voice said.

Sam caught her breath. “I had a bad night, thought you were someone else.”

“Sorry miss, didn’t mean to scare you,” the man said. “I can see you had a bad night with that there flat. I can put some air in tire for you.”

“Sure that would be nice.”

The man went to the bed of his truck and pulled out a small air compressor and filled Sam’s tire. “Your lucky that I was on my way to help out a friend with some tires.”

“I sure do appreciate it. Where is the nearest town?”

“About five miles further on down the road.”