The Moss-Draped Gate

My grandmother, Elowen, used to tell me stories about the old logging roads that snake through the Appalachian hollows, roads that lead to places that ain’t on any map. She’d say, ‘The forest remembers, child. It keeps what it’s given.’ I never understood what she meant until the summer I turned nineteen, when my cousin Lena and her friend, Tessa, convinced me to hike the Hawthorne Cutoff. It was an abandoned rail spur, started back in the early 1900s, meant to haul timber down from the high ridges. The railroad company blasted a tunnel through the mountain, but they hit a vein of quartz that glowed like moonlight, and then the workers started quitting. They said the mountain itself cursed them. One night, a cave-in sealed the tunnel’s far end, and the whole project was abandoned. The tracks were left to rust, and the forest slowly swallowed the road, leaving only a path that dead-ended about a quarter mile past the tunnel’s mouth.

It was a sweltering afternoon in late July when we set out. The air was thick with cicadas, and the sun was trying to burn through the haze. We parked at the old trailhead, a gravel lot overrun with blackberries, and started walking. The path was narrow, bordered by ferns and moss-covered rocks. As we got closer to the tunnel, I felt a pressure building in my chest, like someone was sitting on my ribs. I’m not asthmatic, but my lungs seized up as if I’d run a mile. I stopped, bent over, and gasped for air. Lena and Tessa turned back, their faces worried. ‘You okay, Will?’ Lena asked. I nodded, trying to breathe, and forced a smile. We kept going, but the pressure only grew heavier, and my heart was pounding so loud I could barely hear their footsteps.

We reached the tunnel entrance: a dark, gaping mouth draped in moss and roots. The air inside was cool and damp, and the sound of our footsteps echoed oddly, like they were landing a second late. I grabbed my flashlight and clicked it on, but the beam only went a few feet before being swallowed by the blackness. Lena and Tessa laughed nervously, and we stepped inside. The tunnel walls were covered in graffiti, but some of the markings seemed older, almost like symbols. As we walked deeper, I noticed that my breathing had become more labored, and my chest was so tight I could only take shallow sips of air. I felt a cold sensation on my neck, like a finger tracing my collarbone, but when I turned around, nothing was there. The walls glistened with moisture, and I imagined I could see my reflection in the wet stone—but my reflection was slightly delayed, as if it was lagging behind.

About halfway through the tunnel, the light from our flashlights began to dim, not because the batteries were failing, but because the darkness seemed to absorb the light. I looked back and saw the entrance as a small, distant circle of daylight, impossibly small, as if we had traveled miles already. Then, Lena grabbed my arm and pointed ahead. The tunnel curved, and just beyond the curve, the light from our flashlights revealed a massive iron gate, covered in rust and overgrown with thorny vines. It was locked with a chain and a padlock the size of my fist. But that wasn’t the strangest thing. Beyond the gate, the tunnel continued, and through the bars, I saw what looked like a forest growing inside—trees with twisted trunks, glowing fungi, and a faint mist that moved on its own. My chest was burning now, and I felt a strong urge to turn back, but Lena and Tessa were staring at the gate, mesmerized. Tessa reached out and touched one of the vines, and the moment she did, the iron gate let out a low groan, as if it had just been disturbed.

I pulled them away, my voice strained. ‘We need to go back.’ They protested, but I was already walking, my footsteps feeling like I was wading through mud. As we hurried out, I felt a presence behind me, a breath on my neck. I glanced over my shoulder and saw something move in the darkness—a figure, tall and thin, with antlers that scraped the ceiling. It had no face, only a smooth expanse of skin, and it was reaching out, not to grab me, but to brush a hand through my hair. I screamed, and the sound was swallowed by the tunnel, and I ran, dragging Lena and Tessa with me, ignoring their yells.

We burst out into the blinding daylight, and I collapsed on the grass, my chest heaving. When I could finally breathe, I looked back at the tunnel’s mouth, and I saw it for a fraction of a second: a woman in a white dress, her hair black and hanging over her face, standing just inside the shadow, her hand raised as if in a farewell. Then she was gone.

We drove back in silence. I never went back, but I started having dreams. In the dreams, I was walking toward the gate, and beyond it, I saw my own face staring back at me from between the trees. I woke up screaming, my chest tight. And I knew, somehow, that the gate wasn’t sealed to keep things out. It was sealed to keep something in, and that something had noticed that we had come. Months later, I was looking through my grandmother’s old things and found a photo of a woman in a white dress, standing by the tunnel, her face hidden. On the back was written, in my grandmother’s handwriting: ‘She waits for the one who carries the blood. The gate opens from the inside.’ My grandmother wasn’t Cherokee, but she knew things. And I think I know now what she meant by ‘the forest keeps what it’s given.’ That day, I lost something there. I just don’t know what it was.