“Sure, why not?” you say, spinning the wheel sharply and plunging down the turnoff. What the heck, anything that’ll get me out of the car with this gang quicker.

“Oh, you’re the best!” Suzy squeals, clutching onto your arm happily. “And if it gets too scary, you’ll be here to protect me, right?” She gives you a wide-eyed, innocent smile, then silently mouths “later” to you with a wink. Whoa. Then again…

Ignoring the not-so-polite coughing and glares Paul seems to be shooting you from the back seat, you continue driving. As you go, the brush on either side of the road gets steadily higher and more overgrown, till at last you spy a large forest straight ahead. Having no other way to go, you continue on, the dirt road leading you into a tunnel of branches on all sides of the vehicle. Your headlights provide the only illumination, and as you continue on you notice that the moronic chatter in the back seat has ceased — the only noise now is the strange sounds that seem to be issuing from the trees around you. It sounds almost like… breathing. You clear your throat and turn the radio up a couple of notches.

“Suzy, you, uh... you said this was a shortcut, right?”

“Yes,” she responds, though you notice that she sounds a little less sure of herself now. “My older sister was helping to take supplies to the cabin, and she told me she just followed this path for a few minutes and it got her there really quick.”

Of course, you reflect, Suzy’s sister also racked up five speeding tickets before her 18th birthday. And she was driving during the day. With your present level of visibility, you don’t dare to go too fast, fearing that you’ll miss a curve and drive straight into a tree.

“Hey, is this those woods the millionaire built a mansion in?” Michael pipes up suddenly.

“What?” you say, skeptical. Bad enough you have to play taxi for these kids, they don’t need to haul out the spook stories.

“No, it’s true,” Paul interjects. “They told us about it in English class. This guy wrote a really dumb book, right, but all the critics and teachers loved it and he made, like, millions of dollars ‘cause they teach it at every school in the country. But he hated all the fame, so he built this mansion out in the woods in the middle of nowhere so he wouldn’t have to deal with anyone. Except it turned out not to be such a great idea, because he went totally nuts and, like, hacked his family to pieces with an ax.”

“Are you kidding?”

“Naw, man, it’s for real!” he stresses. “Well, okay, all our teacher said was that no one’s seen or heard from him in years, but I asked Tommy Meyers and he told me what really happened. He said he and some other guys went looking for the mansion one time around here, but they couldn’t find it.”

Come to think of it, you have some vague memory of hearing that story a few years back. Still, it was just a legend, wasn’t it? Shaking your head impatiently, you refocus on the road ahead of you… just in time to see a huge oak appear right in front of you! Slamming on the brakes, your car jerks to a halt just inches from the tree, the others screaming wildly in your ear.

Calming them down (and admonishing Suzy for her language), you take stock of your situation. You’ve reached a fork in the path: to the right, the road leads upward, curving slightly. You can’t tell exactly what’s ahead, but there’s definitely light coming from it, and you see the vague outline of a very large building. To your left, the path continues on into the darkness.

IF YOU THINK YOUR BEST BET IS THE RIGHT, LIGHTED WAY, CLICK HERE

IF YOUR SPIDEY-SENSE TELLS YOU THE CABIN IS TO THE LEFT, CLICK HERE