There's a stretch of road outside my hometown in Ohio that people try to avoid at night. Route 42. On the surface, it's just like any other rural highway—long, lonely, bordered by thick woods on either side, and dotted with a few scattered houses and farms. But there's something about Route 42 that feels… off. Something that's been whispered about for decades. Locals tell stories of strange lights, unsettling figures in the woods, and accidents that happen for no apparent reason.
But the most infamous story? The hitchhiker.
I had heard the stories growing up, but like most people, I didn't take them seriously. People talk. They embellish. They get bored and start rumors to make their small town seem more interesting. And this hitchhiker legend? Classic ghost story material. A lonely traveler who died tragically along the road and now haunts it, forever trying to get home. You know the type.
But I'm not here to tell you what I heard.
I'm here to tell you what happened to me.
It was late October, a few years ago. I had just finished visiting my parents in town and was driving back to my apartment in Columbus. My car was loaded up with leftovers from Sunday dinner, and I had my favorite podcast playing, trying to keep myself awake for the hour-and-a-half drive ahead of me.
It was nearly 11 PM by the time I left, and the roads were empty. Not surprising—most people were either at home or tucked into bed, especially on a chilly autumn night. The wind had picked up, and dead leaves skittered across the pavement like little ghosts of their own, dancing in the headlights.
I wasn't worried, though. I'd driven this route a hundred times. Route 42 was a shortcut that saved me about 20 minutes, and though it could be eerie at night, I had never had a problem with it. I wasn't a superstitious person, and ghost stories had never really bothered me.
I was just past the halfway point, driving through a particularly dark stretch of road with woods on both sides. The trees towered above me, their branches intertwining like a canopy, blocking out the moonlight. My headlights illuminated only the road ahead, a narrow strip of asphalt that seemed to disappear into the blackness.
That's when I saw her.
At first, I thought it was just my tired eyes playing tricks on me. A figure standing on the side of the road, just at the edge of the trees. A woman. She was dressed in a white dress that fluttered slightly in the wind, her long, dark hair obscuring most of her face. She wasn't walking or moving. She was just… standing there, one arm outstretched as if she was waiting for a ride.
A hitchhiker.
I blinked, gripping the steering wheel a little tighter. My first instinct was to stop—maybe she was stranded, or had been in an accident. But something stopped me. Maybe it was the way she stood so still, too still. Or the fact that the night was so cold, and yet she wasn't wearing anything warmer than that thin dress.
I drove past her, the hairs on the back of my neck standing on end as I did. I tried to glance at her through the rearview mirror, but the road was empty.
She was gone.
For a moment, I felt a strange sense of relief. I must have imagined her, I thought. Maybe a trick of the light or shadows. But deep down, I knew what I had seen.
I kept driving, trying to push the image out of my head. I turned up the volume on the podcast, letting the voices fill the silence in the car, but I couldn't shake the feeling that something wasn't right.
And then, not five minutes later, I saw her again.
This time, she was standing further up the road, on the other side. The same woman. The same white dress. The same unnerving stillness.
My heart pounded in my chest. I had just passed that spot—there was no way she could have gotten ahead of me.
I gripped the steering wheel, my knuckles turning white as I pressed down harder on the gas. I didn't look at her as I passed, but I could feel her presence, like a weight pressing down on the car. My mind was racing, trying to make sense of it. It's not real, I told myself. It's just a story.
But as I glanced in the rearview mirror again, my blood ran cold.
She was standing in the middle of the road, staring straight at me, her dark hair whipping around her face.
And then she was gone.
By the time I got home that night, I was shaking. I slammed the door behind me, locking it out of instinct. The apartment was quiet, the glow from the streetlights casting long shadows across the living room. But even here, in the safety of my own home, I couldn't shake the feeling that she was still watching me. Waiting.
I didn't sleep that night.
The next morning, I tried to rationalize it. Maybe it was just my imagination. Maybe I had been more tired than I thought, and my mind had conjured up the woman from the stories I had heard growing up. After all, it was late. And people see things in the dark that aren't there.
But the feeling of dread lingered.
I decided to do some research. I spent the next few days scouring the internet, reading up on the legends of Route 42. Most of what I found was what I already knew—the usual ghost stories passed down through generations. The hitchhiker had been a young woman, they said, who had died in a car crash on that stretch of road back in the 1950s. Some versions of the story claimed she had been on her way to meet her fiancé, others said she had been running away from an abusive husband. But all of them agreed on one thing: she never made it home.
And now, she haunted the road, trying to find someone who would take her there.
But there was something else, something that chilled me to the bone. According to the stories, those who saw the hitchhiker more than once were said to be cursed. She would appear to them again and again, closer each time, until eventually, they would disappear—just like she had.
I tried to brush it off. After all, these were just stories, right? Urban legends meant to scare people. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't shake the feeling that I had seen something real.
It was about a week later when I saw her again.
I had been avoiding Route 42 ever since that night, taking the longer way home whenever I could. But one evening, after visiting a friend on the other side of town, I found myself on a road that fed directly into it. I didn't realize where I was until it was too late. The trees had already closed in around me, and the familiar dark stretch of highway loomed ahead.
I told myself I was being ridiculous. There was no such thing as curses. No such thing as ghosts. I had imagined the whole thing, let my mind play tricks on me in the dark. This time, I would prove it to myself.
But as I drove deeper into the woods, the unease crept back in. The sky was a dull gray, the sun already sinking behind the horizon. I kept my eyes on the road, refusing to look at the trees, refusing to acknowledge the growing sense of dread in my gut.
And then I saw her.
She was standing in the middle of the road, directly in front of me.
I slammed on the brakes, the tires screeching as the car skidded to a halt. My heart was in my throat, my hands gripping the steering wheel so hard I thought it would break. The woman was standing there, just a few feet away, her face hidden by her hair, her dress blowing gently in the wind.
For a moment, everything was still.
And then, slowly, she lifted her head.
Her face—God, her face—was pale, almost translucent, her eyes wide and hollow. Her mouth hung open in a silent scream, her lips stretched too far, her teeth sharp and jagged.
She started to move toward the car, her movements jerky and unnatural, like a puppet on strings. I couldn't breathe, couldn't move. The cold air inside the car felt suffocating, pressing down on me from all sides.
She was closer now, her fingers scraping against the hood of the car, her face inches from the windshield. Her eyes—those empty, soulless eyes—bored into mine, and I felt a wave of terror so intense I thought I might pass out.
And then, just as suddenly as she had appeared, she was gone.
I sat there for what felt like an eternity, the car idling in the middle of the road, my heart pounding in my chest. I couldn't believe what I had just seen—couldn't believe that she had been so close, so real.
I didn't take Route 42 again after that. In fact, I avoided it at all costs. But the thing is, even now, years later, I can still feel her.
Sometimes, when I'm driving late at night, I'll catch a glimpse of something in my rearview mirror. A flash of white, the edge of a dress, a dark figure standing just at the edge of the trees.
She's still out there, waiting for her ride.
And I'm afraid she'll come for me again.
People say that legends like these are just stories, just folklore passed down through generations. But after what I experienced on Route 42, I've come to believe that there's something more to these tales. Some of these legends—no matter how old or unbelievable—are rooted in something real, something terrifying that we can't fully understand.
For months after that last encounter, I couldn't shake the feeling that she was still with me, lurking in the shadows, watching. Even when I wasn't driving, I'd catch glimpses of her in reflections, standing just behind me, just out of reach. I started leaving lights on at night, jumping at every creak and whisper in the house. Sleep became a rare commodity, and my nerves were always on edge, like I was waiting for something to happen, for her to appear again.
But the strangest part? I wasn't the only one. I started hearing stories from others in town, people who had seen her too. A delivery driver who had taken Route 42 late one night swore he saw a woman in white walking along the side of the road. A young couple, driving home after a movie, said they saw her standing in the middle of the highway. Each story was the same—the woman in the white dress, her face hidden, her presence unnerving. Some people saw her more than once. Others claimed she followed them home, just as she had with me.
No one knew what she wanted. The theories were endless—maybe she was searching for someone to take her home, or perhaps she was waiting for a ride that would never come. Or maybe, just maybe, she was looking for something darker, something more sinister. One thing was certain, though: those who saw her were never quite the same again.
It's been a few years now since I last drove down Route 42, and I still refuse to take that road at night. Even during the day, I can feel the weight of her presence as I pass, the dark stretch of highway looming in the corner of my vision, always tempting me to glance toward the woods, to see if she's waiting there.
I've tried to move on, to put the whole experience behind me, but some things stick with you. Sometimes I dream about her—standing in the middle of the road, her eyes wide, her mouth open in that grotesque, silent scream. I wake up in a cold sweat, her face burned into my mind, and I wonder if she'll ever leave me alone.
The stories haven't stopped. People still talk about her, still see her on that desolate stretch of road, standing in the same spot, waiting. And each time I hear another tale, my stomach tightens with dread.
One day, I know she'll come for me again. Maybe not on Route 42. Maybe not on some lonely stretch of road. But she'll find me.
And this time, I'm not sure I'll be able to escape.