When the local trio of best friends disappeared during a summer fair, the town of Blackwood Creek froze in time. Decades later, a routine salvage job on a submerged sedan has unearthed the one thing police missed. The winch groaned as the 1978 sedan broke the surface of the murky creek, shedding layers of silt and algae like a rotting skin. Elias wiped grease from his forehead, his heart hammering against his ribs as the rusted roof emerged. He had spent forty years wondering where they went.
The passenger door hung open, swinging on a single, tortured hinge that shrieked in the quiet morning air. Inside, the vinyl seats were shredded by time and water, but the glovebox remained tightly sealed. Elias remembered Sarah’s laugh, a sound that had been silenced the night of the fair. He stepped onto the muddy bank, his boots sinking into the sludge as he approached the dripping wreck. A smell of ancient stagnant water and metallic decay filled his lungs, making his stomach churn.
He reached for the trunk handle, but his hand shook so violently he had to pull back. “Just a job,” he whispered to himself, though the silence of the woods felt heavy with the weight of forty lost years. He jammed a crowbar into the seam of the trunk and heaved with everything he had. The metal shrieked, and then, with a sickening pop, the lid flew open wide.
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