She steps out onto the bridge and the planks complain. A narrow rope bridge that droops across the ravine, which she must cross to get home. The fog is so dense that after half a minute of careful walking, she can no longer see the side of the forest she has just left.
She knows the bridge and the ravine well, having crossed it many times. There is a creek at the bottom which she can't see through the fog, but she can hear in muted tones when she reaches the middle of the bridge. She knows that although the bridge may rock and moan, it hasn't broken in the many years she has been crossing it.
And she knows the agitated sound it makes when there is more than one person trying to cross.
She halts just past the middle of the bridge, thinking she can hear footsteps mimicking her own behind her. Turning, she can see nothing past a few metres behind her. Except, perhaps a shadow. Perhaps just the darkness of the bridge extending into the fog behind.
Her heart set to a steady pace, she turns back and continues her way across the bridge towards home.
Again. The muddied clack of another set of footsteps, just off-beat from her own footfalls and barely audible. She whips around, pulse pounding in her ears and cheeks flushed.
A darkness, a solidity, in the milky, fluid world behind her. Closer now. Still as a stork.
She runs. Feet pounding the slick planks. Rope handholds bouncing with the momentum. The bridge's knots and hinges screaming with the sudden impacts.
There is a greater weight rocking the bridge behind her, making the ropes bounce in waves, as it barrels along the planks, getting closer.
She breaks out onto the forest on the other side and doesn't stop, boots throwing up mulch as she runs through the bracken.
There is a squealing as ancient iron bolts are torn loose from the rocks. A series of cracks as wooden posts are snapped. The whip of ropes torn free and wood planks drumming down the ravine as the bridge collapses.
She doesn't stop running. Whatever it is, it had ample time to make it across before the bridge fell.
Paddy Dobson
22nd October 2022