“I see it, too,” Harper says, looking up from her own phone. She turns in her seat. “Brecken, it’s bad. Lots of cars.”

“Where?” I ask. Josh hands back my phone and points at the map on the screen. I’m too sick and too panicked to focus. I shove my phone into my pocket.

“It’s supposed to be right up ahead,” Harper says. “Mile marker 204.”

“I haven’t been able to read a mile marker in miles,” Brecken says, clearly agitated. “I can’t see shit!”

The road dips down unexpectedly and a flashing yellow sign at the bottom tells me there is a curve. Another sign announces something else, but it’s covered in snow. There’s nothing—nothing beyond the fifteen feet in front of our car on the road. It’s just the tracks we’re following.

And then I see it.

Lights. Red and white and pointing in what seems like dozens of strange, awkward angles.

“There!” I say, pointing. “Do you see it?”

“I already said I can’t see—” Brecken sucks in a breath and the hill gets steeper.

“It’s the bridge,” Harper says, her voice a high, frightened whine. “There’s a bridge at the bottom of this hill.”

“I see it.” Brecken’s voice is low. Serious.

“Slow down,” Josh says. “Just ease back so you can see.”

The engine slows, but the tires slip. And they keep slipping.

“Slow down.” This time Josh’s voice makes it sound like a command.

“I can’t,” Brecken says. “We’re sliding.”

He steers right into the slide, and then left. He’s good, but the tires have broken loose, and no amount of fancy driving seems to be saving us. The car is fishtailing wildly in both directions, my stomach sloshing with each iteration. I realize we are sliding down the hill, toward the wreck. And it is no minor wreck. It’s the kind of pileup they show on national news.

Dozens dead.

Holiday tragedy.

There is screaming all around me, but I stay quiet. My stomach curls in on itself as we slide faster down the hill, the tires kicking out hard to the right so that we’re moving sideways down the mountain. The bridge is a hellscape, cars spinning and wrecked in so many directions I can’t count them. I can’t even make sense of what’s happening.

But we’re going to be part of it. That much is crystal clear.

Thump!

My head snaps forward at the impact, not from the bridge ahead, but from behind us. Harper screams and Brecken starts a litany of Shitshitshitshitshit as our car spins in a wild circle. I see headlights and taillights and snow and a menacing concrete guardrail. It plays out in an endless loop, a merry-go-round of horror.