the trunk

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"My mom and I were visiting friends and family in Alabama. We were at her friend Amy's house, and they were telling me about all the dumb scary pranks they did in high school, and different urban legends from the area. Before we left for the night, Amy told us a story my mom apparently hadn't heard since she had moved away after high school. I was sitting on the trunk of the rental car as she told the story in the driveway of her house.

The story was about a specific four-way stop where a woman had been hit and killed by an 18-wheeler. It was a hit and run. They say that the ghost of this woman jumps on the steps of 18-wheelers that pass through, checking to see if it's the driver that killed her. Needless to say, we had to go through this 4-way stop to get home.

We got closer and closer to the stop (but couldn't really see when it was coming up on account of very little lighting on the back roads of Alabama). My mom and I were joking about how glad we were that we weren't in a big truck. Next thing I know, my mom says, "Umm... the trunk is open." I laughed and said, "Shut up! That's not funny," thinking she was trying to scare me. She pointed to the illuminated light on the dashboard alerting us that the trunk was, in fact, open. We pulled up to the four-way stop.

"Can you hop out and close it?" she asks.

"Hell no," I scream. "YOU can get out and close it!"

We looked at each other for a moment and decided to wait until we came to a well-lit parking lot to go close it. I kept looking back to make sure it hadn't flown open. My mom drove through the four-way at an excruciatingly slow pace to make sure it stayed down. Then I get to thinking... "Hey mom... wasn't I sitting on the trunk before we left?"

All of a sudden, the trunk slams shut — and I mean SLAMS, like full force, from fully open, slamming down. My mom and I had one of those comical movie moments where we turned to look at each other, turned back, and then screamed bloody murder. My mom then floored it and we raced to the nearest parking lot, frantically screaming nonsense trying to explain what could have happened. The trunk light was still off when we pulled up into the lot of a Hardee's. We both got out of the car and went around to the trunk. On the bottom of the trunk lid (where you touch to close it) were two muddy handprints."

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