CREEPYPASTA - The Haunted Highway

[Applause] [Applause] i wish i'd taken the warning more seriously i should have realized something was wrong when i entered the worker's tent how i wish i had i'd only been on the job for a day we were building an extension to a busy highway no one realizes how dangerous working out on the roads can be no matter how many precautions we take there are road workers killed every single year no amount of high visibility jackets or flashing signs to inform drivers to take care seems to completely stop these deaths it's just the sad reality of the job and it's compounded by the need to work primarily in the dark so that there are fewer disruptions to vehicles during the day but it also means that drivers sometimes don't see us before it's too late i'd been drafted in because the extension to the road was behind schedule so the powers that be had brought in a few extra bodies to speed things up and i was one of them as was my friend scott i was glad to have him with me as he was good fun and always made the hours go by that much quicker working through the night for weeks at a time isn't the most enjoyable way to earn a living but when you have good people around you it can at least be bearable we were being worked pretty hard pulling 12 to 15 hour shifts just to get things back on track and when we were tired something bad was bound to happen i'd been on many large road builds before and while i'd heard of workers being struck by cars and left to bleed to death by the side of the road i'd never actually seen it for myself i guess i was lucky that way i knew there was something strange going on as soon as scott and i were assigned to a lonely stretch of the road it cut through a mountainous area and had a nasty bend to it a blind corner that hid what was coming from the other side i started my first shift at dusk alongside scott meeting the other guys i was going to be working with over the coming weeks they seemed like a nice crowd and as is common amongst road workers there's a lot of gallows humor with very little being taken too seriously a work tent had been set up alongside the road so that we could have somewhere to enjoy some hot coffee and take a break or even shelter from the elements if the sky opened up it was big enough for a table a radio and a few chairs and well not much more i remember how the night breeze would catch the outer sheets and rustle in the darkness allowing a cold draft to make its way inside there were five of us in the team including myself and my friend scott but during our first break at around midnight i noticed that there were six cups of coffee sitting around at the small fold out table this was one more than was needed we were playing a few rounds of cards with the radio one and i started to feel that i was already becoming part of the team when i just casually mentioned the sixth cup who's the sixth man on the team i asked not realizing the seriousness of the question at the time the men looked at each other hesitantly it was as if i'd asked a personal question and they were offended that i brought it up they started to rustle nervously in their chairs finally our supervisor a man named brody simply said that's joe's cup who's joe scott asked sitting beside me at first they seemed reluctant to tell us scott and i wondered when this joe was going to join us as neither of us had seen him working on that section of road that night when no one gave us an answer we asked again in a hushed tone brody reluctantly told us who joe was as it turns out he was a previous worker on that team he'd been struck by a car at night while working on a different road a year before and unfortunately he died from his injuries i thought the cup was then there to somehow honor their dead friend which seemed like a touching sentiment but it soon became clear from the look on the other men's faces that it was an affection that kept the cups sitting at the table whenever they were working together no instead it was fear that kept it there as the nights wore on each time we took a break and sat at that table there it would be joe's cup for all to see filled with coffee and it didn't really bother me by all accounts the other men had worked together for years and if they had their own reasons for keeping joe's cup filled that was up to them but what did bother me was their reactions whenever scott and i brought it up all we'd get were a few nervous glances and then told to keep out of their business quickly we were made to feel quite unwelcome because of our curiosity it became apparent that because we brought attention to joe's cup we were made to be ostracized meant to feel like outsiders and i suppose in some way we were the job was only going to last a few weeks so i decided to just wait it out if they wanted to harbor a grudge then so be it but scott he just couldn't do that it wasn't his style he found our treatment unfair and it was that type of thing that he always railed against one night around 2 am we all sat around the table in the small work tent by the side of that almost silent stretch of road scott and i were talking but no matter how much we tried to have a conversation with the other men we were greeted by stony faces and one word answers that was when scott did it he leaned over and took a large swig of coffee from joe's cup the other men shouted angrily at him to put the cup back immediately even scott seemed shocked by the level of anger his joke had provoked after all the impression that we had was that none of the group had particularly liked joe brodie grabbed the cup out of scott's hand placed it back on the table and then topped it up quickly with more coffee at that point i could have sworn that i heard him whisper under his breath i'm sorry they don't know brody looked at us not now in anger but sadness and said guys this isn't working don't bother coming back for your shift tomorrow i'll make sure you get transferred to somewhere else along the road a few miles away this is ridiculous i said maybe replied brody but you're both going to need to leave now i was getting ready to pick up my bag and head home when scott point blank refused saying i'm finishing my shift no way am i walking off site so you can get me fired in the morning then he put back on his luminous orange waistcoat headed out back onto the road and into the night i remained in the tent for a moment with the rest of the team brody turned to me and said you need to get scott out of here right now i won't be held responsible the other men then refused to work if scott and i didn't go home and it seemed childish but i lost the desire to argue at that point fine i said and walked outside to find scott by then he was up at the blind turn where we had been working previously and so i shouted to him and as i did a truck screeched around the corner it struck scott head on and i watched an utter horror as his body was crushed and broken under the wheels i ran as fast as i could to help him but i knew he was already dead scott's death was listed as a standard road accident the type that's not unheard of among road workers but i had seen what had happened and i knew there was little doubt that it was normal a month later brody agreed to meet me for a drink to discuss what had happened he was not surprised that my questions focused on joe rather than my dead friend away from his team brody seemed more open to talking about it he told me that joe had always been a nasty piece of work no one on their team liked him he was cruel spiteful and took great delight in mocking those around him he had an obsession with being the quickest of the team when it came to put downs and like all bullies more than anything he wanted his place at the top of the pecking order one night brody's team were working on a country road joe was a distance away from the others putting out cones to close off part of the road that was in bad need of repairs but as he did so he stumbled on uneven ground falling flat on his face the other men laughed at him from down the road and why not joe was always mean to everyone else and it seemed only fitting that he should get a taste of his own medicine he shouted something but no one heard what he said the team was laughing too loudly at him brody said he'd never forget the look in joe's eyes as he stared up from the ground towards his colleagues who were in hysterics there was venom there utter hate he just couldn't handle being the butt of a joke for once he clenched his fists as if wanting to start a fight but for some reason he didn't move the laughter continued until a couple of drunk locals came swerving down the road in their car careening straight into joe and crushing him to death as it turned out joe had twisted his ankle when he'd fallen and had most probably heard a car nearby and it shouted for help brody admitted then that though he did not blame anyone for it he felt that in some way they'd left joe to die he also felt that whatever was left of him held them responsible ever since then each member of the team had felt it a horrible presence while they worked brody called it the evil eye but he recognized the feeling it was the same that he had felt when joe had looked at him just before he was killed but why the cup i asked because said brody fearfully anyone who's taken joe's place on our team has come to some sort of harm it's only through giving joe his place at the table that things seem to calm down we still fear him but at least no one gets hurt until scott i think joe prefers it that way to watch us all squirm with fear and admit that we're scared of him i wouldn't have believed the whole thing if i hadn't seen it for myself i'd have explained scott's death as a tragic accident and left it at that but i know that's not true i saw what happened that night scott didn't fall onto the wrong side of the road he was pushed he was pushed by a dim figure of a man dressed in orange worker overalls who looked on with a grin on his face as my friend was crushed to death before fading away into nothing i do wonder all of this time if brody and his men still work on those roads most of all i wonder if joe's cup is still placed at the table during each break and if anyone has ever dared to drink from it i know i certainly wouldn't be sure to tune in every monday wednesday and saturday at 3 p.m eastern standard time for brand new content from me and remember to follow me on discord and twitch as well as my team who make these videos possible you'll find all of their respective links in the description below this video thanks for watching

Channel: Matthew Santoro

Views: 107,601

Rating: 4.9806609 out of 5

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Id: bBdNG-eH8zQ

Length: 11min 30sec (690 seconds)

Published: Sat May 15 2021