Deadman's Drift

A Hurtville Horror Story by Scott Farmer

Highway DD cuts through the Ozarks like a scar—winding, narrow, and flanked by trees that seem to lean just a little too close. Locals call it Deadman’s Drift, but you won’t find that name on any map.

If you ask the highway patrol, they’ll say the accidents are just bad luck—tight curves, loose gravel, tired and drunk drivers. But folks who live near Hurtville’s old border know the truth.

They’ve seen the Figure.

It always happens the same way.

You’re driving late at night, maybe headed back from the lake or dinner, maybe chasing a cell signal.
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The moon is high, the fog starts low, and you come around that last hard curve past mile marker 17.

That’s when the air changes.

Cooler.
Heavier.
Like the road is holding its breath.

And then you see it—a figure in the center of the lane.
Not walking.
Just standing.

Tall.
Thin.
Wrapped in what looks like rotted burlap, soaked to the knees. The face is wrong—blurry, pulsing, like your headlights can’t quite touch it. But the eyes? Two white orbs that blink out of sync.

Some say it’s a man who drowned when Table Rock flooded the valley. Others say it’s a remnant of something older—a watcher from when the Osage warned not to build or bury on this land.

Whoever—or whatever—it is, the result is always the same:
You swerve. You crash. Or worse… you stop.

Those who survive say the Figure doesn’t move until your engine dies.
Then it glides—glides—to your window.
And if you look into those blinking white eyes…
you remember everything you’ve ever done wrong.

Every lie. Every theft. Every cruelty.
The Figure whispers your own voice back to you.
Then it’s gone.

But many don’t survive.

They find their cars twisted into trees, tires still spinning, no sign of the driver.
Just a streak of wet footprints across the windshield
and burlap fibers caught in the seatbelt.

The town tried to fix it once.
Put up reflectors. Warning signs. A guard rail.
None of it stayed up more than a week.
The signs rot. The metal warps.
And one night, a road crew truck went missing entirely.
They found it upside down in a dry creek bed, cab full of muddy water, keys still in the ignition.

If you must drive Highway DD at night:
Don’t go alone.
Don’t answer the radio if it cuts to static and your name comes through.
And whatever you do—don’t stop for the Figure.

Because it’s not asking for help.
It’s not a ghost.

It’s a warning that you’ve already gone too far.

Some roads are dangerous.
This one doesn’t want you to leave.
Deadman’s Drift.