There is a road around the corner from me called Seven Bridges Road that ends at Barnegat Bay. The road is barely two lanes, not well cared for and has, you guessed it, five bridges. Yes, I know, they stopped after five. The last two would have taken you all the way to Brigantine, then Atlantic City, but the ocean floor had other plands. The last few bridges are rickety single lane bridges, where the planks pop and crack as you drive over them. Once you get to the end of the road, you are greeted with a jungle of brambles, poison ivy, and Bay Laurel surrounding a narrow strip of sand that leads to a bay beach straigh ahead, a Rutgers research station to the right, and a marshy bog of tidal ponds, good fishing, crabbing, clamming, and possible seal sightings to the left.

Certain times of year, you take your life in your hands as you walk down that narrow strip of sand to get to the other side. Brambles reach out trying to grab you and pull you into the jungle, wrapping around your ankles if you takes to long, You can hear the minions of hell coming for you if you stop running. You see deep within this jungle lies one of the portals of hell and every year around June 15th, this portal opens slightly, unleashing an army of near indestructible green heads sent by Lucifer himself to torture the people of my town for 3 months.

Two years ago, Willy and I were driving down Seven Bridges on an especially hot muggy day in late July. I slammed on the brakes as I saw the object in the road. Already moving slowly, the diamondback terrapin stopped to look at me briefly before continuing on. The green heads immediately smelled our blood even with the car closed up and started dive bombing the car with the furious intent of a piranha eating fresh meat.

The music in the car was drowned out by a hail storm of green heads. Willy looked at me with a combination of fear, frustration, and acceptance. He knew he had to go out and pick the terrapin up and carry it across the road so it coul continue safely on its route. There’s no point in arguing with me and he knew it.

No, we can’t just go around it, what if the next driver doesn’t see it? I, obviously, can’t do it, I’m the driver.

Willy has been through this before and it showed. He put his hand on the door handle and let out a sigh of resignation. I put my hand on his and told him I loved him with my sweetest smile, dripping with honey and the butterfly flutter of my eyelashes. He took a deep breath and jumped out of the car, scooped up the turtle and ran across the street like it was hot lava. In his haste, he had forgotten to close the car door! “Willy, the car door!!” I screamed but my voice is lost in the buzz of Satan’s flying minions. I reached, stretching as long as I could to slam the door shut, but it was too late, as green heads were already pouring in. I smashed one on the window, “got you, motherfucker”. Like the Terminator it stood up, unbreaking its legs and flew at my face in and angry rage intent on revenge. I was swinging wildly in the car trying to keep them at bay, opening a window wouldn't help, neither would opening my car door, I was trapped until Willy got back.

Willy, where IS Willy?

I looked up and he was still five feet from the car doing some crazy dance that looked like a clown on fire that was trying to do the Irish jig. I screamed his name to break him out of his green head induced mania. He looked up and within seconds was back in the car. We now had at least 30 of those rage filled demon bugs in the car. As we drove off, we opened all the windows in the car and drove until they all blew out before we went home.

Willy and I don’t go down Seven Bridges in July or August anymore.

The Portal to Hell