We turned left, walking parallel with the tracks until the path began to incline. Then suddenly ahead of us loomed a large bridge that the tracks went under. Graffiti was painted on the side: Ghost Girl Lives in bright pink, and below that, Where Are the Children?

I stopped to take it all in. The bridge was an eyesore, an imposing concrete monster in an autumn woodland. It snuck up on you, with its rusted grating, concrete pilings, and overgrown weeds. It wasn’t hard to grasp how such a structure could inspire an urban legend in a sleepy privileged neighborhood.

“Come on,” Ellen said enthusiastically, heading toward the incline. “How often do you get to see a haunted bridge?”

I was wary of going up there. A crude wooden barricade had been placed at the top, and signs screaming NO TRESPASSERS and DANGER STAY AWAY warned against lingering, but the wooden planks had been pushed aside, probably by teenagers like Ellen, who gathered here after dark to smoke and drink and lord knows what else.

I could see the appeal for Lily. That tragic, dramatic tale. A young, depressed bride, scorned and outcast, feeling like there was no other choice. Leaping to her death in a wedding dress.

“The story goes that if you’re out here late at night, very quiet, you can see her appear at the top of the bridge.” Ellen pulled my hand, trying to drag me up. “I’ve seen her,” she said. “Many times.”

I trailed her to the top but stopped at the wooden barricade. I wasn’t going to walk out on that bridge. It looked, despite the hulking pile of concrete, precarious, as if, in the dying light, it could all crumble to dust.

“Are you scared, Theresa?” The way she said my first name was off-putting. Lily’s friends in Philly had called me Ms. P.

An animal howled in the distance, and a tree poking out over the top of the bridge swayed.

“No,” I said. “I just—I don’t think I have the right shoes...”

Ellen left me there, walked onto the bridge with confidence until I lost sight of her. But I could still hear her voice traveling clearly through the air.

“There’s one thing I don’t agree with. Everyone says she’s sad. That she comes here to reenact her death. That they can hear her crying.”

Something creaked—how sturdy was this structure? “Ellen, I think maybe you should come back...”

“That’s bullshit, in my opinion. I think she returns seeking revenge.”

Behind me, the sound of crunching gravel on the path. I shifted, saw someone coming fast, and stepped back. A loose rock in the incline tripped me and I fell, let out a scream as I slid down toward them.

“Theresa?”

I looked up. Greg was looking down at me, holding out a hand. He lifted me to my feet.

“You okay?”