Crossroads Encounter

I recently moved to a small town in Mississippi. A town that was full of rich history, a town that never truly went through any reform since the Jim Crow era. Everything had a beauty of its own, natural beauty in every green space and historic beauty in every town road and small town center.

I had only been there three months and couldn't help but discover the rich history of music engrained within the fabric. The story of Robert Johnson is heavily told here. His influence on music shows up every night in the local clubs they used to call Juke Joints. It's hypnotic and so catchy that I find myself dreaming about the music.

There's not much to say here other than my often dangerous curiosity about some very interesting topics I come across during my life. Or at least, I find them interesting. Others may classify the desire as foolish or nonsensical.

Everyone I asked about this subject responded with sort of a nervous laugh. When I expressed to them that I was serious I had some different responses. A few people were quick to tell me that I better not mess with that sort of thing. That I needed to be careful not to mess with the devil or tempt him into coming out to me. A couple of folks even said to me that I looked like a nice guy and didn't need that stuff in my life.

I persisted however, a couple told me how to get there and the explanation came with caveats. One was, "don't go on a full moon night." Another was, "don't go on a Friday or Saturday night, the young folks sometimes drive like crazy through there and act stupid." I thanked them for their advice and made my plans.

I picked a friend who wasn't as open-minded as I was and in fact, much more skeptical than I was. I find that having a skeptic as a witness to something supernatural makes things much more interesting. A person with too open a mind will often frustrate me. Some persons are just "happy to please," or "open to delusion and forcing themselves to see something," which is an insult to my attempt at a scientific sort of proof.

My friend, Mike was the type who was accepting of what he believed was my overactive imagination. He always said to me that if he actually witnesses anything while with me then he will never question me again. This, I loved. Much better than being disregarded for my introduction to the possibility of the existence of a supernatural world.

Mike and I cautiously drove to the spot described by the last guy who told us where the exact spot was supposed to be. Unexpectedly, we saw a makeshift shack there on the southeast corner. It was an actual snack sales spot. There was a forty-something-year-old man inside, selling the snacks. We were shocked and thought we must be in the wrong spot. I walked up to the shack with Mike and asked what this place was. The man inside happily said that he was a seller of Crossroads Snacks. "So this is the famous spot where the Devil made a deal with Johnson?" I said. "Hell yeah, this is it. I'm selling snacks for when they start making movies and stuff. I figure I'll make a killin', " Mike and I laughed but decided to buy some snacks since they were so damn cheap.

We arrived at the crossroads a little before twilight. Mike and I sat in the car after we bought all those snacks. We got out and walked around the crossroads, looking for anything out of the ordinary, and talked about what to do. We weren't sure what would trigger the activity of a deal with the devil or maybe a demon or a spirit or whatever. So we both came up with our own requests to make some sort of deal.

Sometimes I hate my own, self-denigrating, self-destructive, morbid curiosity. More often than not, I find myself regretting what I have done, especially if someone, other than myself, gets hurt. That happens a lot more than the odds in a chance game would logically retrieve. I was a bit worried about Mike. He lives the "single life" now but really spends a lot of time with his family back home. I kept thinking of what his family would say to me if he were hurt or got killed somehow on this particular foolhardy mission. I decided to just put it out of my head, as I remember from numerous warnings in movies and books, that the Devil will use your fear against you. Who fucking knows if we'll get even a dog or a rat to show up here, much less likely, the Devil.

Mike started to get a bit sleepy around 10:45 pm and decided to head to the car to catch a quick nap before getting back to the crossroad. I continued to sit on the waterproof tarp we put on top of the gravel pile next to the crossroad. Around 11:30 pm, the air got a bit still and somewhat heavy. I could no longer hear any corresponding road traffic on the other roads nearby. Silent and uneasily so. I heard the occasional rustling in the weeds across the road and sometimes in the wooded area behind me. Because I was particularly uneasy about snakes in the south, I kept my flashlight close and my senses were peaked. I grabbed a few small pebbles from the road and lightly tossed them at the car to get Mike's attention. Couldn't wake the fucker up at first but the third try was the charm. He got up and joined me noisily. "shhh, I said quietly." I pointed across the road where there used to be an old telephone pole with a street light, looked like it had been torn from the ground and burned. Maybe during one of our southern, heavy storms or even a tornado, this happened.

Behind the remaining ragged, and burned stump stood what looked like a fox or a coyote standing on its rear legs, looking in our direction. Freaky looking as hell. It seemed to occasionally bob its head and then stand up again. Never really wavered from the spot. Mike said to me, "man, that's too tall to be a coyote, and definitely ain't no fox." Yeah, that is all I could say.

Right then, I could see something moving on my peripheral right. I jerked my head over to see what it was, and my body jumped from what I saw. Mike quickly noticed my movement and jumped when he saw what I was looking at.

A man, I think, tall but kind of hunched over with an obvious deformity to his head, face, and shoulders. I don't think those were the most obvious abnormalities that stuck out to me. It was that he was wearing something like a trench coat, this close to summer, in Mississippi. It wasn't sweltering outside but definitely too hot for this sort of coat to be worn. Who knows, maybe he had a medical condition of some kind. He was stopped in the center of the crossroads as if he were stuck there like a statue or an action figure, unable to move by his own motivation. I couldn't get past his dead stare, glaring right at us with a smirky smile.

"What you boys waiting for?" We looked at each other and Mike spoke out, "Who said we're waiting for something?" The man, who was looking at Mike when he spoke, turned his gaze to me. "Who you lookin' for?" I said, "depends on who shows up."

The man laughed, then looked at both of us. "You didn't bring anything did you?" I asked, what do you mean? He said, "Everything brings a gift or something." You don't go to somebody else's house without a gift, ain't polite." Mike asked, "what should we bring?"

The man shrugged his shoulders, "anything is better than nothing."

Just then, the coyote made some sort of loud screech mixed with a howl, making us look in that direction. Even the odd man looked. After seeing the coyote jump over the stump and run off into the woods, we looked back and saw the man was gone. We stood up and scanned the area and could not find him. "Alright, that's not cool, I'm freaked out a little now," said Mike. All I could say was, "We better watch our backs out here. Who knows what kind of people hang out in these woods." Stranger still, we could smell the heavy waft of frankincense after the man disappeared.

"We better get a gift or some offering if we want this to work."

"There's nothing open this time of night out here," said Mike. "That dude was some sort of guide, I think." I thought the same, then headed to the car. "We're leaving?" said Mike. "Just getting something out of the car." I pulled the remainder of our snacks from the car and piled them neatly in the middle of the crossroads, precisely where the odd man stood. There were no footprints leading to or leaving the spot where the man stood. Mike had previously noticed that the gravel road showed almost every step we made in the reddish-orange dust. I pointed it out to Mike. He shivered and folded his arms as he looked out over the landscape nervously.

With our new offering sitting in the road, we retreated back to our spots on the tarp. Looking at the pile of backwater chips, Three Musketeer bars, Butterfingers, and coconut candies, I could only think that there was a reason the shopowner was selling this crap in the middle of nowhere. Hopefully, it would be enough to tempt whatever shows up here to grant wishes like a Djinn, to answer our strange queries. Mike said he thought that with the deal being to grant a wish and being paid for with your soul, why would we need to bring an offering or a gift at all? Makes sense but then offered to Mike that maybe, the gift is just to gain an audience with the being but promises nothing.

Around 2:30 am, a heaviness drew over the air and made both of us feel a kind of tipsy feeling. Shortly afterward, the tipsy feeling was replaced with a sort of energetic confidence. I felt strong and my thoughts were very clear. I could tell that something similar was happening with Mike because of the knowing smile that we both exchanged.

All around us, insects, small animals, and anything that crawled seemed to come out of their hiding spots and move in the open. We both lost our smiles and stood up quickly for fear of being crawled upon or bitten or stung by any of these things. We could hear the unsettling sounds of insects as they crawl over everything. The sound of hundreds or thousands of cicadas overwhelmed our ears, causing us to cover our ears.

We both looked at each other with a sort of panic and started slowly moving toward the car. We hadn't made it three steps before all the sounds suddenly stopped, and it was deathly quiet.

I started to get the feeling we were being watched, and Mike was breathing heavily while sweating profusely. Both of us were hesitant to look behind ourselves at the crossroads.

Mike suddenly fell to the ground. I reached out as if to catch him but I was too late. He hit the gravel road with a thump that had the added sound of crushing an empty water bottle. I could see that he was still breathing, just as I felt a hand on my shoulder. I reluctantly turned around to see a gentlemanly-looking fellow smiling at me. He was dressed in a business casual sort of way and was very calm and inviting. His stature and physical features reminded me of my own, except more mature and distinguished. As if all of his questions about the world were already answered.

I thought to myself, that if this guy is the Devil or a demon then many people have him depicted all wrong. The Bible was closer in the description, saying that he was, in my way of saying it, not bad looking and definitely not with horns and goat features. This was someone I could probably relate to. In many ways, it crossed my mind that I wouldn't have minded if this guy was my long, lost father who didn't stick around for whatever reason.

Anyways, I felt like crying, big stupid man, crying in the middle of nowhere at three in the morning. Holy shit, it's 3 am.

I gathered my gumption and stood directly in front of the man and decided to ask outright, are you the Devil? He chuckled and said that he had been called many things over time. The funniest one, he said was the name, Devil. "I don't feel devilish in the least. What do you think?"

I said that I don't know what to think. "I was somewhat surprised to see anyone out here at all, even though I felt that I would." "Good," he said. "That is the beginning of knowledge, going beyond your normal thinking processes, and letting your feelings and intuition guide you," I said that I wanted to find out if the legend was true. If Johnson actually made a deal to be the best musician. He said to me that he only asked to play as well as I would, so I lent him a part of me. He accepted and offered up his being, his soul in service. I rejected it but I warned him that channeling my energy would shorten his physical life. He accepted it anyway. End of story.

I asked, why here? The devil told me that "its high energy here and all sorts of entities are drawn here. He called and I listened." He continued to smile.

I want you to think about what I've said and test a few things out. Come back in twenty or so years. If you come and call, I'll be here. Maybe we'll talk more.

I then heard Mike, behind me rustling and moaning. I turned to see and turned back to see only the coyote on the other side of the crossroads, looking at me with glowing red eyes, and then he hopped over the side brush and into the woods. The man I was speaking to was gone.

I went to help Mike get up. He told me that he made a deal with a snake to lose weight. I said, "I thought you passed out." He said, "and miss this? no way man. I'm finally gonna lose this gut." I said I hope you didn't trade your soul for that." Mike said, "oh shit! he never asked for anything in return, I hope it still works."

I'm sure it will Mike, I'm sure it will."

"Sorry, you didn't get anything."

I said, "I got what I was looking for, confirmation"

In three months' time, mike lost about 50 pounds. All thanks to his deal with a snake.

20 years passed by and I haven't had the need to return to the crossroads but I will this summer. Maybe to have a talk with the man who could've been my own father. He was also the greatest guide I've had.

The illusion was set, my mind believed at the time that it was the type of encounter that I could easily tell others about and spread the word about. The Devil had an agenda, the kind of agenda that left me feeling good about the encounter and unknowingly, would spread the falsehood that there was nothing to fear from the Devil's deals. He made me believe that this wasn't even a deal, it was more of a gift. All lies.

My mind has always been a little bit unconventional in the interpretation of occurrences. I feel it was this slight quality or flaw, whatever you may call it, that allowed me to see through this illusion.

I played back my memory of that night, it showed like an interactive movie. I could still feel the still, heaviness of the air, the smells, and the sights, without the lies and illusions.

Replay

I was standing there, in front of what I assumed was the actual Devil. I saw the strange-looking man with a hump standing next to the handsome man. He never left the crossroad. He spent his time slowly encircling, in a slow back-and-forth pace, around me and the Devil, smiling the entire time. I wasn't sure if he was just there to watch or maybe protecting the encounter. I also saw several creatures, milling about. Imps, I believe they're called. Three of them were huddled over Mike's head and whispering something into his ears. These Imps looked to be about two and a half feet tall, some had stocky bodies and others were curiously thin. All had a sort of grayish complexion, lighter or darker depending on whichever one you stare at. Some had a sort of reddish hue, some had a forest green or black tone.

The snakes, bugs, and other ground-dwelling critters were still out and about in abundance and never left the area, and they never quieted down. The actuality of the surroundings was, in appearance, chaotic but controlled by the entity I call the Devil.