Waiting For The Bus

My story takes place three years ago in the town of Bethany, Connecticut. I lived in this town for 3 years before I moved to upstate New York for college. It is an extremely small rural town with lots of farmland, trails, and livestock. Horseback riding is very common; you see people riding every day. I loved living there, even if it was kind of out of the way. In high school I met my girlfriend, who lived three towns over in Milford, Connecticut, a 30 minute drive from my small town of Bethany.

One night in early autumn, we were over my house for dinner. We sat and watched a movie and then it was time to take her home (I was only 18, she was 17, she wasn't allowed to sleep over). It is about 10:45 at night and she and I cram in my little Mazda3 sedan, and we take off. In Bethany, there are NO streetlights, so the roads are very dark. We drove about two miles out and my girlfriend begins to panic because she left her cell phone over at my place. Frustrated, I decided to turn around and head back to get it. I took a left down a road called Old Mill Road. Across from this road is a large concrete manufacturing plant; the road is about 100 yards long and is a dead end, a gated-off trail is at the very end where people would horseback ride. However about halfway down the road another road branches off from Old Mill which leads to residential homes. It is PITCH black out and I drove slowly with my high beams on.

Our car starts to approach the end of the road when we see two people standing near the gate. I switch to low beams, as I didn't want to blind them. My girlfriend said something like "huh, what are they doing?"

I started to make a K-turn to turn around. I put the car in reverse, turning on the white reverse lights. As I back up, my girlfriend said "watch out for those people..." I look out my rear window to see the two people. It was a man and a little girl, maybe about 7 years old. He was wearing jeans and an orange shirt. His skin was darker, possibly Hispanic. He was holding hands with the young girl who wore a pink shirt and had on a small pink backpack. It looked as if they were waiting for the school bus, but it was 11pm at night.

I then said "they better move out of the way, I gotta back up," it was a narrow road. I backed up toward them until they were only feet away from my rear bumper. They never even moved. Most parents who see a car backing up toward their child would have shuffled them out of the way. They just stood there. My girlfriend, who babysat, said, "geez, way to protect your kid... Almost backed into them." I sat back in my seat and glanced in my rear-view mirror to see the man and the girl illuminated by my reverse lights. They didn't have faces. From their shoulders up was fuzzy and transparent with just the outline of their heads, I could see straight through to forest behind them. I then got that awful feeling of horror mixed with dread and sadness. I just stared at them. I put the car in drive and slowly pulled away, watching them disappear into the darkness.

I didn't say a word. In my mind I was panicking; what did I just see! My girlfriend then said, "that was so weird, what was he doing out there with his daughter at this hour with no flashlight. That was so dangerous." I then said as calmly as I could manage, "baby, they didn't have faces". I was almost in tears. I never had an experience like this before. She then started saying that I was scaring her and she didn't know what I was talking about. I then pieced it all together: a man and a little girl waiting for the bus at 11 o'clock at night, its pitch black out. We almost backed into them and they didn't move out of the way, and to top it off they had nothing from the shoulders up. They were ghosts.

Like I said, I've never had an experience like that. You say to yourself that it is just a ghost, I am a strong 18-year-old with big muscles, I am not afraid of anything. But I will admit, I was scared. My girlfriend ended up sleeping over my house that night, and I am thankful for the experience, as scary as it may have been, as it confirmed my belief in spirits and makes for a great [TRUE!] story to tell my kids someday.