into Lexington and then into Louisville. He and Sylvia in the front seat. Sawyer and I in the back.
I’ve been silent mostly, absorbing their easy banter with each other. Sort of like how Nazareth, Jesse, Leo and I used to be before Leo left for college. Their gentle jabs at each other, the jokes—the new and private ones, their laughter, the way they argue yet have each other’s backs makes me miss my friends.
It’s not like I don’t see them. I do, but not as much as they’re busy with life, and then there’s how I haven’t responded to Leo. Even though he still texts daily, begging for us to be friends again.
Sawyer squeezes my hand and I lift my lips as I look at him to let him know I’m okay. I give him and his friends credit, they’ve tried to include me, but they’ve been friends forever. I’m new, plus I’m the weird girl they gossip about. I officially have a better appreciation and respect for how Scarlett was brave enough to waltz back into Jesse’s life.
“Tell us more about this place.” Miguel takes a left when the light changes to green then looks at me in the rearview mirror. “What ghost are we hunting tonight?”
“Sometime around 1950 there was a couple who were going to a dance and they crashed their car when they missed the curve on Mitchell Hill Road. The legend says that people see a girl walking along the side of the road in a prom dress. She’s also been seen walking in the cemetery that’s at the top of the hill.”
“Why are there so many stories of teenagers dying in car crashes and then of the girl walking along the side of the road?” Miguel asks.
“Probably because they crashed due to the boy’s stupidity, and then the boy was too lazy to go get help so she had to do it herself then died of disappointment,” Sylvia says.
I laugh. “Good one.”
“Thanks. I asked my parents about this place as Dad grew up in Louisville. He said that when he was a teenager, he had heard that if you saw the girl and pulled over she’d get in the backseat of the car and then disappear when you reached the cemetery.”
“Your dad knows about this?”
Sylvia turns all the way around, her long blond hair falling over her shoulder. “Yeah. He’s weirdly happy I’m doing this project. He said that one time in high school he and four of his buddies drove along the road trying to see the ghost and were hoping to pick her up.”
“And if they found her where was she going to sit?”
“Dad said he volunteered to let her sit on his lap.”
Our combined laughter, including me, feels good. As if I’m somehow part of their group and they want me there.
“Papá said he and his friends once went to Pope Lick trestle in Louisville to try to find the goat man.” Miguel follows the instructions on his GPS, turns onto Mitchell Hill Road and we begin the ascent up the hill. “I’ve heard all sorts of crazy stuff about that trestle. Why aren’t we checking that place out?”
“Because a goat man isn’t a ghost but a man who is part goat,” Sawyer says. “We’re trying to prove ghosts are real, not goat people.”
“True, true,” Miguel adds, and we fall into silence as Miguel’s motor lightly strains as we continue up the winding and steep hill.
We lost the friendly porch lights of neighborhoods over a mile ago. With the climb up, the foliage thickens. The limbs, heavy with the start of fall leaves, lean over the road, as if threatening to collapse and crush us.
The sky is dark, thick clouds racing along the windy night. A sudden break in the trees reveals the Louisville skyline in the distance and the miles and miles of neighborhoods below. It also discloses the steep, rocky drop. Miguel jerks the car more toward the center of the road as Sylvia gasps and holds on to the armrest of the door.
“Be careful,” she whispers. “Another car could whip around the curve and hit us head-on.” And push us off the road and over the cliff.
Miguel goes from driving one-handed to two.
The cliff. Sawyer’s drawn to the drop-off, his head resting upon the glass. I squeeze his hand, and when he glances over at me, I spot a glimpse of the war being fought inside him. I squeeze again, to let him know that while I don’t