Chapter 19: Birch & Pine

Bridgewater is a production of iHeartRadio three D Audio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey For a full exposure listen with headphones. Listener discretion advised, Shelley.

I Nope, not ready to talk to you yet. So I look, I understand that you guys need a place to stay for god knows what reason, But I Nana's.

House is haunted.

Uh huh wow.

Just because we're under one roof, it does not mean we're a family. Jeremy, You're welcome here, you always have been. Unless did you know that that you know he was my father?

No, I'm I'm I found out, uh last week or I guess I guess I sort of figured it out.

You would have told me, though, right like if live hadn't, because god knows, my own mother didn't seem to be in a hurry.

I I don't know.

I was still trying to adjust to the idea of having a family that I didn't know about, and then my dead father came back and.

Right right, I'm sorry, It's just this is probably very weird for you too.

Yeah, I know, it's going to take some time to.

Not talking to you.

Remember, Oh Jesus Godmother, how could you have never told me it wasn't just my decision, Nancy Bradshaw.

I agreed that we didn't want to cause a chaos in your Bradshaw.

Okay, you both knew that we were going to know each other.

We were going to the same school.

Honey, How was I supposed to know that you were going to skip a grade by the time you were in the same high school?

It was too late?

Oh it's my fault.

Great, But now when I am forty with two kids who have grown up without their uncle, now is just the perfect time.

I think that we can all agree that this situation is less than ideal, but it's situation that we have, and I think.

We're pretty goddamn lucky to be in this situation at all.

Dad, I think you're right. I mean, there really is nothing we can do about the past.

Dad.

Well, Jeremy had you as a father at least for a little bit. And so what is it I'm supposed to call you?

You can call me whatever you want.

I know I don't get to ask for more.

All right? Anyone want to order a pizza?

Ah? Yeah, ha ha ha. Can you just be honest with me? Was that the worst lecture I've ever given.

No, I thought it was fine.

Why are you sugarcoating it for me?

Can you have to remember your worst is still better than half of the professor's here a ha.

So you just admitted it it was my worst.

Jeremy A.

This all just feels so futile, to say the least.

Well, I think you can be forgiven for having a hard time focusing on telling a bunch of teenagers about the cultural reasoning behind the creation of the Dover Demon myth when you now know there's a pretty good chance that the Dover Demon isn't a myth at all, but an actual demon who might actually be out there attacking people.

Oh my god, I don't think the Dover Demon is actually big enough though, to have left a handprint on that hand. You know, yes, I know, I know. How are you feeling about everything? We haven't really had a chance to talk about anything since.

I'm okay, I guess the only thing is getting my degree now suddenly feels way less important, but not unimportant enough to just stop doing my work.

Well for what it's worth.

I'm really grateful for that, because I am barely keeping the curriculum together as it is.

I definitely would not be able to do this without you.

Right now, I just feel like if each of us is giving half of our all, that adds up to something like one hundred.

Right, it's very inspiring.

I guess I should I should feel lucky that at least my work is related. I can pretend that grading papers is going to give some sort of clue about what kind of monsters we're dealing with.

Well, any luck, so far.

Between everything we've encountered and the sightings I've been tracking from the seekers, activity is definitely kicking up.

Are the secret sightings?

Are?

Are they the same kind that we've been encountering?

Well, there's some overlap. So we know for certain that there's a giant black dog and a giant ape like

Okay, so it's basically the greatest hits. Yeah. Are you getting any.

Sense of how many of them might actually be reliable?

Well, the Mothman and alien ones intrigue me the most, although there's also something to be said for the werewolve sidings. We don't get a ton of those.

Is it weird that despite everything all of this, like the legends like were wolves and vampires, those just still seem far fetched to me for some reason.

No, No, I think I get that. I mean, we don't really know the bounds of all of this yet, right, but both were wolves and vampires are so tied into the human world, actual people being transformed into something else, and we haven't seen any evidence of that yet, So.

Right, right, right, You know, I think it's eminently possible that those those legends they're coming from some actual supernatural sources, but there's a misunderstanding of them, like creatures from the Fay realm that are human enough, and then it seems like they're from our world or something like that. I don't know, it's like, that's.

What I was thinking about the werewolves. We know there's some kind of canine creature and something bipedal.

Right, and the mothman and the alien sightings.

The alien sightings are almost certainly puck wedgies or willow wisps or something like that, right, right, And then the mothman, I mean he's large and he has wings, which is like the thunderbird.

Right. But I was also thinking what about this of maybe it's the Jersey Devil. Right, thunderbirds have wings and claws, but the Jersey Devil has wings, claws, and teeth.

You think that that might be the thing that killed the camper, but it would have smaller arms.

Or something like it.

I know this is in New Jersey, but nothing to say. The monsters don't move around though, right.

And maybe the gates do too. I was thinking about the legend of the Jersey Devil. How supposedly Jane Leeds had twelve children and then poof.

Right right, right right, and then her thirteenth transformed into a monster.

We think that the Leeds family actually did have twelve children, and I always thought that maybe they did have a thirteenth, but they died or were still born, and that's where the legend comes from. But what if the thirteenth child was given over to the fay Realm.

Oh, my god, like a sacrifice after the pay Realm sent a creature to terrorize the town, a.

Wy burn or a griffin or some kind of winged creature that then got transformed into a local myth that casts Mother Leads as a witch.

That's a very interesting thought, right.

I realized that really this doesn't help us now.

But no, no, no, no, it's good. It's good to be thinking about this stuff. From everything, I was gonna say, it helps to be as prepared as possible in case we run into whatever's out.

There, But that the problem is, there's really.

There's no way to be prepared for any of this, is there, truly?

I got breakfast with Peyton this morning.

What Yeah, I.

Wanted to follow up with her on the room. You saw her carve try to understand exactly how they work. And it's magic, obviously, but it doesn't seem like complicated magic, or at least a complicated bit was already been done by the Gathering through the years. Apparently there's all kinds of runs throughout the Bridgewater Triangle that have been keeping things fenced in.

I don't know how well they're working.

Well, it seems like the gate doesn't actually have a fixed point.

So you are actually serious about the gates moving around?

Well, I don't know if one could hop from New Jersey to Massachusetts, but I guess it's shuffled around to different spots in the triangle, which is why the ruins haven't been all that effective.

And then Peyton said that she can keep things out, but she can't keep things.

In right exactly, So I was thinking, what if we created a kind of border around Freetown Forest. I know the gate might not still be over the lake, but if we can make the whole area around the lake impossible to pass through, then.

And for all intents and purposes, the creatures would be.

Kept in, yes, at least until the gate moves.

Well, I think that's worth a shot. At least it could buy us some time. Did Peyton seem up with that idea?

Yeah, she drew out the ruins for me. I was actually hoping you'd go to the forest with me and start carving them in.

Please. Why doesn't she want to do it herself?

She said she's needed in the swamp today.

Okay, okay, so you and me going back into the woods to do magic.

And with the room my friend taught me the other day. Hopefully we'll be covered.

If we actually run into anything. I have a feeling this isn't what you expected when you signed up to be a ta.

Actually, this was exactly what I expected from this job.

Shelley, you're home.

Have you just been sitting in the kitchen waiting for me?

I thought maybe we could talk.

I had such a terrible night's sleep last night that I had to skip out on work early. In fact, I've had a series of terrible night's sleep, so I would like to sit down and just not think for a little bit.

Well, then sit down here at least and let me do all the talking. Mom stop, Look, baby, I don't know how long we're going to be staying here, but I think we should figure out how to live together peacefully while we're here.

I'm fine having you guys stay as long as you need to, but that doesn't mean that we need to interact at all.

Shelley, it's three pm.

It's three pm, the day after my lying mother showed up on my doorstep with the father and brother. I never knew about in Toe, so I think that I have earned a glass of wine.

Do you mind pouring me a glass?

Then? Yes, I do.

Mind.

You haven't really yelled at me yet, you know, if you want to yell at me, go right ahead.

I don't want to yell at you, Mom, I'm not. I'm not even sure that I'm angry, not anymore. I just I'm I'm more sad. I know you robbed me oh so much of knowing who my father was, the chance to ask questions about him, to keep him with me as I grew up, of having a brother.

I know, I know.

Do you want to know what hurts the most?

Mom?

You robbed me of you?

I mean you never there was always this canyon between us.

I'm so sorry.

No, no, it's not. I'm not saying that you were a bad mother.

It's not.

I always knew that you loved me and that you would do anything to protect me, and you raised me to be strong and thoughtful and to take no shit from anyone, and I am I'm really grateful for that. But but you kept yourself like at this distance always, And that's the thing that I kept thinking about as I lay in bed last night, because it's just too much. Mom, there's too many.

Changes to my reality that you brought to my door, and so the only thing that I could focus on after seeing you was how all of it answered a question I've been asking my whole life.

Who your father was.

No, No, not that question, the question of why you are the way that you are. No, it makes sense. No, you didn't know how to connect with me because when you looked at me, you were reminded of him, of what you lost.

Shelley, Shelley, No, it's okay, No, it's not, Shelley. That's not at all why you are right. There was a distance between us, and I could feel it growing bigger and deeper with each passing year, and I, you know, I never knew how to fix it, but it never had anything to do with you.

I love you.

I love you more than anything in the world. You and Live and Ethan are the most important people to me, and I would.

Do anything anything for you.

I know that, and all the failings I had as a mother keeping you at arms at length that never ever had anything to do with you. You would do things sometimes that reminded me of Thomas, you know.

Like.

Those expressions that you would get or the way that you were always so practical, But those honey, only ever made me happy that he lived in you. You know, he never made me sad that I could see your dad in you.

But then why, oh, just.

Something broke in me.

At the time when Thomas first disappeared, there was hope and no hope that he would turn up, we'd find him, and then that hope kind of just turned into waiting for answers, and by the time I realized neither were coming, I was nine months pregnant and terrified. We were so excited when we found out about you. Thomas had already been planning on leaving Nancy, he had told her as much. And then this amazing thing was happening, and Jeremy was really warming up to me, and it felt it felt like,

But I had you.

I had lost the most important people to me, and one feel swoop and at the same time, I began the best part of my life, the part where I get to be your mom, and it was it was just too much, you know, it was it was like my heart was so overwhelmed with feeling and grief and joy and anger and fear.

I just I just shut down.

And then I I never really started back up again.

I think.

I think that's the most I've ever heard you talk about your feelings.

Yeah, well, they've been a little hard to access for the past forty years, and I'm really sorry for that.

I wanted to give you so much.

And if I could go back and do it all over again, even if that meant losing Thomas and Jeremy again, I would do it. I would do it a thousand times if it meant I could get it right.

For what it's worth. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. You lost so much.

I gained more.

And look, you know, now here we are and we're all together again, and it's.

Weird.

Well that's putting it mildly.

Yeah, yeah, but it could be good. We could have the family we were always supposed to, or at least something close to it.

Maybe, yeah, maybe.

Wow, You've got a lot of posters. I wonder if Jerry's wall was like this when he was.

Young, if there's anything like my mom, I doubt right.

I don't recognize any of these bands. I guess that shouldn't be too surprising.

Yeah, I guess not. You know, I think maybe I should set you up on some.

Sort of Google playdate because you still haven't been on the internet, right Google.

Yeah, I'll be honest, I'm still a little intimidated by it.

But you're pretty good.

At all of this stuff, right, all this technology stuff.

Yeah, I always been really into it.

But this, this radio, it's a bit out of my skill set.

But but that that that program is helping.

YouTube tutorials are the answer to every question.

YouTube.

Okay, all right, tubular should work?

Now do you know what was wrong with it?

Just a short and here we go.

Well done.

Well that was the easy part. Right now, we've got to figure out how to tap into the liminal. Do you remember what it was like to try and call out to Nana when you were over there?

There wasn't you know, any strategy to it. I just I was just trying to get through.

Man.

That must have been scary.

Come on, let's get this thing going right.

Okay, So what station do we think Carrie's ghost broadcasts.

I guess we could just scan through a bunch of different frequencies see if anything pops out.

Okay, I am im both. Yeah, this might take a while. There are a lot more stations now than there were in nineteen forty.

Yeah, I bet maybe I can hear some of the new music.

Whoa here you okay?

Yeah?

Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. I'm just no, No, I'm fine. I'm fine. It's just my chest is a little tight for some reason.

Do you want me to get you some water or something?

No, I'm fine.

Let's let's say go ahead's communicate with the other side, h Olivia.

I'm fine.

Oh it's a beautiful day. Huh. Okay. So she said to be sure to carve the ruins in birch, beach or pine, but not hickory.

Okay, cool. Do you even know what those trees look like?

Oh? Yes, I do. Birch and pine are both pretty distinctive.

Great, so let's stick to those and just say fuck beach, fuck beach.

She didn't say we had to use all three types, did cheap?

No, just that there are best woods for channeling the magic. So how are you doing?

Oh what do you mean?

I mean, I know you've known Shelley for a.

While, but oh yeah that Uh, I'm okay. I feel like I've I've had time to adjust, not fully.

But at least. Uh.

I was hit with the revelation that I have a half sister before my dad reappeared.

Shelley was given that one two punch.

Yeah, Olivia was too Oh.

God right, you're right. I didn't even think about that.

We haven't really had the uncle niece talk yet.

I guess.

Is that is that a talk that people have seems like.

A talk we're gonna need that. I don't know. God, I can't believe Joseph Hoskins is my brother in.

Law, you know, I mean, there really is no way to exaggerate just how small this town is.

Huh, there really isn't. I really don't like that guy. Well, things seem pretty calm today. Maybe what ever Peyton's done so far as working.

I hope So I really don't want to run into that dog again.

Speaking of which, have you checked in with a doctor about that? No, it was just a scratch.

I'm fine.

How do you how do you know?

I mean, Okay, I guess magical dogs probably aren't risk of transmitting rabies.

Oh god, I didn't even think about that. What if I have some kind of magical rabies?

I definitely don't think you have magical rabies.

Oh hey you're here.

Hey.

You say carve magic runes and I say show me where.

H Viippin.

This is the legend tripper I was telling you about the one who I kept running into taught me that rune.

Oh hi, and this.

Is my friend Nippin.

Nice to meet you, Vippin.

So why do you say I definitely don't have magical rabies? Couldn't the dog be carrying some kind of I don't know.

Curse maybe, but it's unlikely it be transferred through its claws. You didn't get bitten, did you? No, then you're probably okay. Bites are really what you have to worry about with synanthropes. If you'd gotten scratched by a mantic core or a fad felon, it'd be a different story. But it seems like you got lucky.

Lucky, right. Hey, you sound pretty confident about all this.

Told you she was pretty knowledgeable.

Yeah, I've been around the block.

Oh you've had encounters.

I know it's all real, if that's what you.

Mean, right, But to be clear without proof.

Well you believe before you had proof.

Right, No, I wanted to believe. That's different from claiming to know exactly what kinds of dangerous monster I suppose when you haven't actually seen one.

Whoa, whoa. I didn't mean to offend.

No, no, no, you didn't.

I just think it's a little weird, that's all.

Yeah, this is all a bit weird. That's kind of the point, right.

No.

I mean the fact that you seem to just be going around the wilderness waiting to run into people, so lecture them on what you think you know about the supernatural.

I feel like we got off on the wrong foot.

Can you excuse us for just a second. Hey, man, are you okay? What's going on?

Don't you find this suspicious? The woman she just showed up I texted her. Yeah, But I mean before, where did she come from?

What is this really about, Vivian?

Are you worried that she's wrong, that the dog claws really could have done something to you?

No? No, no, it's not that it's I just have a bad feeling, Jeremy, you met the rest of the legend trippers.

Some of them might be a little too fanatical, but they're good allies for us to have. Okay, and she's been super helpful to me. Just give her a chance. I actually think you'll you'll come to like her, maybe you'll maybe you'll even become friends.

Okay, Okay, yeah, I'm sorry. I don't know why I got so I'm good.

Okay, all right, good, let's go everything.

Okay, yes, we're good.

So I guess Peyton was deemed trustworthy after all.

Oh yeah, yeah, she's actually been surprisingly helpful. She gave up and a bunch of information and then these runes.

Right ah, yeah, she made the snake disappear with a protection room. So we thought we'd contribute to the cause by.

By carving more runes. Yep, I'm all aboard. So what is it? Birch and beech trees are what we're aiming for, right and pine? Sure, sure, pine, as long as it's not hickory.

Yeah, impressive.

This isn't my first time carving protective runs, if you can believe it, But this might be the first time that I'll be doing so with complete confidence that they actually work. Because you still haven't tested the one I taught you have you?

Well, we hope this will work.

Just because Peyton did it right doesn't mean we'll be able to can I see?

Uh?

Sure?

Thanks? Uh huh? These look good, though, I think maybe she didn't finish this one. See here, these lines are supposed to connect. Do you have a pen um?

Yeah? Yeah, here you go?

Oh thank you? See like that? Without those lines, I think this would be the room for separation, which I have a feeling is not our aim. Here.

Oh good catch that.

Yeah, I guess.

I'm cheating a bit. I actually have a tattoo of this room.

No shit.

Wow, wow, you really are committed figure.

It can't hurt to be protected at all times.

So this works on individuals as well, that's the hope.

Another room from that conference friend, But like the hand sign, it has gone untested. Oh now I'm realizing maybe the tattoo is why I've never had an encounter before.

Well, I hate to take away your hope of seeing a monster even more, but we should probably get to carving these rooms.

No, you're right, no more dead campers is the most important thing. Oh, I can go first. Huh. This birch tree should work wait.

Are you sure?

Oh, she's just gonna go for it.

Okay, Now I should just say we probably shouldn't expect anything to happen right away. We're not actually banishing anything to the other realm. And I imagine that we need a bunch of these before anything actually starts.

What was that?

Maybe something sealing up or maybe there was something here and it just feel this?

What?

Holy?

Oh my god, run road run?

What is that?

Ah shad, I think we found your Jersey temple. I think get bothimore like its for fuck?

What is that? Oh my god, it's definitely a thunderbar handy.

I can't see anything.

Get the fuck way.

Don't way too many, there's way too many. What is it?

What is it?

What does it? Ben?

The center down ship?

Whoa?

I think your means.

I think it's working.

I feel oh my god, oh my god, I worked.

Or shit, shit, it sort of worked.

Oh hold on, come on, let's get away while we can wait.

Wait this way, this way. I have a friend's house over here.

It's just past the woods where we can hide. Ben, come on faster there, let's stop.

That's our house.

Let's go. Oh shit, fuck, I forgot she's a she's a Shelley's.

She's not the whole bas Okay, there's a She's somewhere.

Here does here?

It is?

I got it?

I got it.

I got it.

Ship hold a second? Okay there in in?

Okay?

Oh my god? Fuck shit?

Is everyone okay?

Yeah? I think so? You okay? Yeah? Oh my god, I think we're safe.

This episode of Bridgewater was written by Lauren Shippen and directed by Brendan Patrick Hughes assistant director Sarah Klein. Sound designed by Vincent De Johnny Rima El Kali, Josh Thayin,