Always Say Goodbye
By: Renee Handy

I sat in the passenger seat of the pickup truck clutching my Christmas gift to my chest. It was mid-July now, but I still hadn’t opened the box; I had only removed the holiday wrapping paper to reveal what was beneath.
	“Are you sure this is a good idea?” I asked as the truck continued to travel down the gravel road. I had an uneasy feeling and wasn’t quite sure where the night would take us. This seemed like a fun adventure while we were all sitting around my kitchen table, but now that we were slowly getting closer to our destination as the dark woods surrounded us, I was starting to regret my decision.
	“C’mon, it will be fun. I bet no one else has done this.” Alex said to me as he briefly glanced over from behind the wheel. Silence then fell over the vehicle again and I couldn’t help but to take a loud, deep and exaggerated breath.
	“Seriously, calm down. It’s creepy, sure… but it isn’t real; we all know that.” Brandon chimed in from the back seat, breaking the silence.
	I rolled my eyes and turned forward again as we pulled off to the side of the dirt road. After a few moments, Alex backed the truck up again and swung the front end around so that the lights illuminated the woods. There, in front of us, was a small and secluded cemetery, at least a century old; it was a popular place for children and young adults to visit as a scary joke or even party, but no one that we knew had done what we were about to do.
	“Leave the truck running,” I said quietly as I opened my door, “We need some lights but I don’t want the battery to die and then we get stuck up here.” Alex complied and both he and Brandon slowly emerged into the cool summer air behind me. I reached into the glove compartment and removed the plastic bag filled with candles and looked over at the guys.
	“Are you both ready?” Alex asked as he motioned toward the small opening in the rock wall that lead to the well-worn footpath through the graves. With a slight nod, Brandon started toward the cemetery and we both followed reluctantly. Immediately, we proceeded to the largest headstone of them all, directly in the center of the small wooded lot, our shoes becoming wet from the dew that had settled on the grass already.
	Once we were standing above the body that was six feet below us, having been decaying for over a century probably, both Alex and Brandon knelt down and arranged the candles in a circle of sorts, lighting each one as they placed them. Then, Alex looked up at me and outstretched his hand. With some hesitation, I let my grip on the box I had been holding loosen and I handed it over to him, almost not letting him take it from my hand as I didn’t feel good about this idea at all. He gently lifted the lid of the box and a smile crossed his face as he exposed the beautiful etchings of the Ouija Board that hid beneath. He set it down in the circle and then placed the planchette down as well, positioning himself so that he could just barely rest his fingertips on the smooth piece of plastic. Brandon also situated his body beside the board and just as I was about to complete the circle of energy, the words etched on the headstone we were kneeling in front of caught my eye and I quickly straightened up.
	“Do you guys see what I’m seeing?” I ask as their gaze quickly follows mine, “The saying on the headstone, can you read that? It says, ‘Remember me as you pass by, as you are now, so once was I. As I am now, so you must be; prepare for death, and follow me.’”
	“That is creepy as hell!” Alex replied, “That makes this whole thing even cooler.” Brandon tentatively shook his head in agreement and then turned back to the board. I sighed again with a roll of my eyes and knelt back down next to them. With a deep breath, I placed my fingers on the planchette and looked at my companions and nodded that I was ready; the only thing is, I wasn’t actually as ready as I thought I was at the time.
	“Alright, is anyone there?” Alex asked the board as he looked around the shadowy graves that surrounded us; no response.
	“Let me ask this time. Is anyone there? Does anyone want to talk to us?” Brandon whispered. With still no movement on the board, he looked at me, “Okay, your turn.”
	“I’m asking the spirit world, is there anyone that wants to talk to us through this board?” My voice quivered. Almost instantly, the plastic that sat beneath our fingertips started to move and eventually came to a halt over the word ‘YES’ that was written in the corner. I looked up at the both of them and saw the surprise in their eyes and that was when I knew that neither of them had done that themselves, and I knew for a fact that I hadn’t either. That was the moment that the air began to feel heavy and I could sense the fear that was emanating from us all.
	“Okay, now let me begin the conversation by asking this question,” I took a deep breath before continuing to ask the board the final question for the evening, “What is your name?”
	I didn’t know how much I would regret asking that question until a few seconds later. At first, the board sat there in the wet grass completely motionless. Then, out of nowhere, the planchette began to move; at first it settled over the letter ‘Z’ and we all looked at one another confused as it moved across the board and hovered over the letter ‘O.’ Before we could even process what was going on in front of us our hands were jolted by what felt like electricity and the planchette began to move faster and faster, across the board, between just those two letter. It went on for a couple of seconds before I ripped my hands away from the board and shoved both Alex and Brandon away as well. The second all of our hands left the board the lights that had been shining on us disappeared and the air around us became completely silent; there was no longer a hum coming from the engine of my truck.
Before I could say anything, tears started to pour down my face and I could barely breath; however, I didn’t feel sad or even necessarily scared… yet the tears still kept coming. In a hurry, Brandon blew out the candles and shoved them back in the bag as Alex threw the board back in its box; Alex grabbed my arm and pulled me to my feet, rushing me toward the truck. This time, I got in the driver seat and looked down at the ignition to realize that the keys had completely turned back, the truck hadn’t just simply died, it had been totally turned off. To my surprise, the engine started with ease as the guys climbed into their seats with quite a commotion. Before they could even get their seatbelts on, I had backed up onto the gravel road and sped away from the cemetery without even knowing where I was going.

We drove for about fifteen minutes in complete silence when suddenly my heart sank; Alex noticed my face drop and looked at me as we both heard Brandon gasp. He followed my gaze and glanced up into the rearview mirror. I could see, even in the darkness, that all color had drained from his face and we all let out a blood curdling scream.  It was at that moment that I realized that we never said ‘good-bye’ and there was now a fourth passenger in the back seat.

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	As I opened my eyes, all I could see was the now deflated airbag shriveled on my lap, broken glass and smoke floating up and away from the smashed front end of the vehicle; there was a tree sticking up from the middle of the crumpled hood and that’s when I realized what had happened. I straightened up my back with a cry of agony as the pain jolted up my spine and slowly looked around to assess the damage that had been sustained by us all. Alex was slumped over in the front seat, head against the window, blood trickling down his face from a gash above his eyebrow. I reached over to check his pulse and felt a decently strong heartbeat beneath my extended index and middle fingers and sighed with relief. With stiff movements, I turned around to check on Brandon but was surprised to find an empty back seat, the passenger side door wide open. That was a good sign, he was most likely alive and fine, but where could he have gone?
	I turned back to Alex and gently rested my hand on his shoulder; I began to move his body back and forth, whispering his name to arouse him. After a few seconds, his eyes fluttered open and he began to groan in pain. I raised my finger to my lips to encourage him to be quiet and then used the sleeve of my sweatshirt to wipe the fresh blood from his eyes.
	“It’s okay,” I whispered, “We were in an accident but we are all okay. Can you at least move your legs so we can get you out of here?”
	“I think so,” he replied as he began to move his legs back and forth, “Do you want me to try to get out so we can get you and Brandon out too?” I looked over and realized that my door was up against another tree and that there was no way I would be able to open it and get out.
	“Yeah, can you do that? Brandon must already be outside the truck because he isn’t here and his door is open.” I said as Alex turned around to see the empty back seat. He turned back around and grabbed the door handle and used his shoulder to shove it open; it took a few tries but finally the metal gave way and the door burst open, leading Alex to fall out onto the wet grass. He began to laugh and I did too, crawling over the center console and emerging from the truck, now standing over him. I helped him to his feet and we turned toward the vehicle to try to assess the damage. The truck had continued straight on a sharp curve and struck a tree; it was going fast enough to cause a lot of damage, but not enough to kill us so that was a plus.
	I walked around the truck and still couldn’t find Brandon; this caused my heart to sink. What could have happened to him? I sat on the tailgate that was still intact and pulled my knees up to my chest. Alex looked around quietly and then sat next to me, wrapping his arm tightly around my shoulders and he rested his head on mine.
	“It’s okay, Sarah. He’s got to be around here and he should be okay for the most part, I didn’t see blood anywhere and he probably got out of the truck all by himself. We need to call for help, we can’t just wait until someone comes looking for us or just happens to drive by. You know how secluded it is up here, that’s why we came to begin with.” He pulled me tighter to his body and took his phone out of his pocket. He groaned in annoyance and I looked down at his screen; no service. I rolled my eyes and stood up again, taking a few steps until I was standing on the moist gravel.
	“Well let’s walk toward town until we get service and maybe by the time we get back we will have found Brandon or maybe he will come back to the truck. You know?” Alex said as he walked toward me. I nodded in agreeance and began to walk beside him, by now the sun was starting to come up so we didn’t need any type of flashlight. After a few minutes of walking Alex stopped dead in his tracks in front of me and I almost ran right into his back.
	“What are you doing?” I asked in confusion as he simply raised his hand and pointed directly in front of us. There, in the center of the road, sat Brandon; his back was to us and he appeared to just be sitting cross legged and staring straight forward. We both looked at each other and slowly began to walk up behind him.
	“Brandon? Buddy? Is everything okay?” Alex quietly asked as we got closer and he extended his arm to rest his hand on Brandon’s shoulder. The second Alex made contact, Brandon’s body jolted as if we had just awoken him from some type of deep slumber.
	“Huh?” He turned around to face us and then slowly rose to his feet, “Is everything okay? What are we doing just standing in the middle of the damn road?”
	“What are you talking about? We had no idea where you were and we just found you while walking to get cell service,” Alex looked at me in confusion before looking back at Brandon.
	“You mean to tell me that you don’t remember anything?” I asked, “You don’t remember how you got here?”
	“I mean, I remember the cemetery but I don’t know why we aren’t in the truck and we are just standing here instead. Was the truck actually dead?” Brandon looked around apparently looking for the vehicle he thought he hadn’t even gotten into yet.
	“Are you sure you’re okay?” I took his face in my hands and looked him over for any sign of injury but he didn’t even have a scratch on his entire body, “We left the cemetery and then something really weird happened and we both woke up in the wrecked truck, we had hit a tree, and we had no idea where you were until we just found you while going to try to call help. You mean to tell me you don’t remember any of that?”
	“No, I literally just thought we never got in the truck but now that I really look around, we aren’t anywhere near the cemetery, are we?” He suddenly turned white as if he realized something was very wrong. I wrapped my arms around him with reassurance and started to lead him in the direction we were already walking. The journey toward civilization was completely silent, except for the sound of the gravel under our shoes, and seemed to take forever. Before we even got to the end of the road the silence was suddenly broken.
	“He’s following us.” Brandon whispered eerily and he stopped in his tracks, “Do you see him?” We both slowly turned to look at our friend and before I could say anything Alex gasped and grabbed my arm tightly, motioning to the shadow behind Brandon. That’s when I saw the dark figure again, the same one I had seen before blacking out and hitting the tree. It was at this moment that I again couldn’t catch my breath and everything started to spin; I felt my body begin to fall and the world around me went black before I hit the ground and the screams coming from Alex’s mouth slowly faded away.