There is an old covered bridge deep in a wooded area near my house. It is still used, but not very often as there was recently a new route connecting the backroads to the main ones. There may be an actual name for it, but around here it is known as the “666 Bridge.”

 There is one “6” in the front, one in the middle of the bridge and one at the end, so I suppose that’s how it got its name. But with a name like that, of course there are some creepy legends that accompany it. The most famous of these is of the girl who hanged herself from its rafters. Another odd thing about the bridge is there are scriptures and Bible verses carved out on pieces of wood and are hung hapharzardly on the underside of the bridge. This still remains in existance to this very day. One cool night, my two friends, Kelsey and Kennedy, and I decided to visit the bridge, as it often was the “hangout” for bored teenagers who have nothing else to do growing up in the backwoods of Pennsylvania. We parked our car at one end and Kennedy walked through the bridge to the opposite end, leaving Kelsey and me on the first end. We were chatting and awaiting out friend’s return when Kelsey suddenly gripped my arm very hard. Her eyes were wide with fear and I remember saying, “What’s wrong?”

She replied, “Look!”

All around us, a thick fog had crept up. It was so dense that we couldn’t even make out Kennedy’s form on the opposite side. But that’s not what she was looking at: A lone figure was walking along the road toward us, and slowly the fog revealed the body of a girl. She was wearing jeans and (despite the sudden chill) a T-shirt and had short brown hair that hung at her shoulders. She smiled warmly at us as she passed by and said, “Hi” and then continued on through the bridge.

Kelsey looked nervous and I certainly felt that way. I remember straining my ears so we could hear the girl as she passed by Kennedy on the other side. But instead we heard a rather strange, hollowed sound coming from deep within the bridge. As if someone (or something) was calling in an eerie voice saying, “Hooooooooowwwwww. Hooooooooooowwww.”

At this point, Kelsey and I jumped back in my car and turned the lights on. Kelsey began screaming out the window for Kennedy and soon he appeared, looking ashen and very worried. When he got in, we quickly told him about the girl and the voice and though he paled at this. He insisted he didn’t see a girl or hear anything except for our excited chatter echoing throughout the bridge. At this, I turned my car, and instead of going through the bridge, retraced our way back on the road we had come.

This really happened and it still gives me chills to think about. And like I said, the bridge still stands to this day, along with the strange scriptures beneath it.