The storm came on strong from the northeast, wreaking havoc overnight in the quiet town of Bridge Creek. The trees lining the forest that surrounded the town’s borders came crashing down all around. Luckily for the people of Bridge Creek, no homes or cars were destroyed in the wreckage. Some power lines were damaged, but they were nothing that couldn’t be fixed. However, in the western part of town, which was somehow quieter and more desolate than the east, irreparable damage had been done.
In the West Parish graveyard, the great oak tree had been struck by lightning. It burned to the ground, and as the rain fell on the ash, a black hole opened where the roots once held the tree. The hole was large, eating away at the grass and turning the dirt into dark, black sludge. At the top, gravestones lay toppled and sunken, and their respective coffins fell deeper. One old wooden casket lies open, just barely containing its skeleton.
The only people in town who knew that, though, were Heather Green and Jen Shaefer. It was the night after the storm, and like every Friday night, they met at West Parish, always under the great oak tree. They were the only two who ever visited the old parish; anyone buried there had no living relatives, as the entire west side of town had been abandoned during the gold rush and never recovered in population. Most residents stayed on the east side, near the river and the state highway. Aside from a gas station, a few half-empty cul-de-sacs, and the abandoned parish and its cemetery, there was nothing on the west side.
Heather and Jen met every Wednesday night behind their friends’ and boyfriends’ backs to share a bottle of cheap wine and perform fake Wiccan rituals they read about in a dusty library book, which they believed to be probably useless. It was just before sundown when the sky cast a cerulean glow over everything and everyone.
“It must’ve burned down.” Jen held up a blackened branch of the tree.
Heather nodded. She reached down and pinched the dirt between her fingers, “It’s like tar, it feels so weird.”
“Do you think we should call someone? Say, ‘Hey, there’s a big tar hole where the oak tree used to be and a body is about to fall out of its coffin, so much for resting in peace.’ Like, who do you call to say that?”
“Beats me.” Heather shook her head, staring into the dark center of the hole. It was so completely black it was almost black. “It kind of looks like a tunnel.”
Heather stared at the abyss in the center. Jen didn’t notice her becoming entranced. Jen was surveying the damage around the gravestones while Heather stepped deeper and deeper into the hole. The night had darkened a bit, and then, all at once, like it does in late autumn, the hole in the ground looked blacker than black, and from that blackness emerged a glowing red light. It was faint at first. Heather was nearly at the bottom; the dirt grew stickier with each step, and right at the center, when she finally reached it, the ground pulsed beneath her feet, like a festering wound. The red light grew brighter from beneath the black, revealing roots-like veins in the black tar earth.
“Jesus, Heather, when did you get all the way down there? Get away from that!” Jen called from above. Heather wasn’t that far away; she would’ve heard Jen. She should’ve heard Jen. But she was only looking at the ground, first from her feet, then she dropped to her hands and knees and buried her fists into the earth. She glowed red, and the air around her looked deep purple.
“Get up! What are you doing? Why are you doing that?” Jen shrieked and descended into the hole. By the time she reached the bottom, Heather had buried her arms entirely into the earth.
“It’s opening.” She said, craning her neck to look at Jen standing above her in horror.
“What? What the hell are you talking about?” Jen pulled Heather by her waist, but she was unmovable. “Get out of there, Heather! You don’t know what’s-”
Heather cut her off with a blood-curdling scream. A murder of crows shrieked and flew away overhead. The red light was blinding and radiating heat. Where Heather sank her hands into the earth, a gaping red hole opened, glowing from the pitch-black abyss around them. Heather slid headfirst into the hole, and it swallowed Jen right after, cutting off her scream and plunging the graveyard into complete silence.
The girls were stunned.
At the entrance of the earth hole, they stayed curled, legs intertwining in the dark, pulsing red light. The entrance was warm. The longer they stayed stunned in place, the brighter the red grew, illuminating a tunnel before them. The walls of the tunnel were narrow and sticky, like the inside of a body.
“Okay, let’s go,” Heather said abruptly, wiggling her legs free so she could come onto her hands and knees.
“We don’t even know what’s at the end of that tunnel. I’m not trying to find out.” Jen replied.
“I don’t see any other way out. What do you want just to sit here until we die?”
“No,” Jen said defeatedly. “Maybe we can go back out this way,” she shimmied around to face the opening they fell through, but it was firmly sealed, black tar earth.
Still, Jen tried to punch it.
“Shit! It’s solid,” she exclaimed. She tried to hit it again, but this time she kicked it. But it made no difference. The only way out was through.
“Let’s go,” Heather said, biting back the urge to mutter I told you so. She focused on the glowing light at the end of the tunnel and began to crawl. Jen, on her hands and knees, followed suit.
As they crawled through, the floor of the tunnel’s slick, sticky film clung to their palms and soaked the knees of their jeans. It was like a hole in a graveyard; the closer they got to the end of the tunnel, the stronger the light glowed. The walls throbbed around them, and the fleshy floors of the tunnel became stickier and more slippery.
They were halfway to the light, like the hole in the graveyard, and it seemed to be contained by a thick, skin-like film, roots like veins glowing in the backlight. Heather peered back at Je, whose face remained pinched with disgust.
“This is kind of like a fucking vagina, right?” she laughed.
“Can you not say that?” Jen said, biting her lip and taking a breath. “This is so disgusting.”
“Okay, but can you admit this is cervix-like?”
“Yes, it’s cervix-like. Okay? Now, please stop”
“Okay,” Heather hummed in satisfaction. They were plunged back into silence, but not for long. “It could be worse, though it could be like a penis.” She said musingly.
“Heather.”
“Okay, okay. I’m done. For real now.” She smiled at herself
The tunnel narrowed as they reached the threshold; the light was bright, and they both had to squint to protect their vision. The air smelled faintly sweet like burnt sugar and rain. The walls pulsed steadily, a heartbeat; it all seemed to seep out of whatever was on the other side. Heather slowed, crawling forward until her palm met the wall. It flexed under her touch.
Jen froze. “Please tell me that didn’t just move.”
“It’s like it’s alive,” Heather murmured. She prodded harder, and the thick barrier stretched under the pressure. The wall shifted again, reacting. Heather’s hand slipped through the sticky skin until it opened into a chamber—a vast hollow beneath the earth. From floor to ceiling, thick black roots curled around a single pulsing mass at the center, glowing like an ember trapped under clay-like dirt. Pieces of wood and bone tangled in the roots, headstones split by their growth. It was as if the oak tree had pulled the whole graveyard underground with it.
“Holy shit, do you think this is hell?” Jen’s voice startled Heather.
“I don’t know. This isn’t what I pictured hell to be like. It’s not hot at all.”
The girls climbed to their feet. Heather stepped closer to the glow. The glow deepened, beating in time with her breath. When she reached out, her finger sank into the warm sap bleeding from it.
“Wow, you’re just reaching into everything tod-” Jen was cut off.
At once, a light burst outward, filling the chamber. Images flickered across the root-veined walls: figures with shovels, a coffin being lowered, a lightning storm over the same oak centuries ago. The visions moved too quickly to observe, but Heather could feel the tree’s memory like a pulse in her skull; Bridge Creek being built, burned, forgotten, grown over.
The light began to fade, roots stirred restlessly, closing in like a slow inhale.
“It’s closing! Jen shouted, but Heather remained. “Heather, come on! I really think we should go now!”
Jen grabbed her arm, yanking her backward. They stumbled toward a narrow fissure in the roof where a faint white light glimmered. Heather boosted Jen up first, her hands slipping on the slick roots, then scrambled after her. The soil gave way easily this time, as if the ground wanted them out. It rejected them.
They clawed through, into the cold night air, gasping. The graveyard was still and black. The hole was gone. No tar, no fire, no trace of the oak. Just a soft circular patch of damp dirt.
They sat there for a long time, shaking, too tired to speak. Somewhere in the trees, a single crow called once, then nothing.
By morning, the parish was roped off with yellow tape and local news vans. Heather and Jen sat on the curb, dirt-stained hands wrapped around gas station coffee cups, neither mentioning what they’d seen. When they finally stood to leave, Heather glanced back one last time. Where the oak had stood, a small sapling swayed in the breeze. Its stem was thin and red-veined, and when the wind brushed its leaves, she could have sworn it shimmered, just faintly. It took a breath.
The great oak tree was gone, but its shadow remained.