The Crossroads game is dangerous - DO NOT DO IT… by Josh
The "crossroads ritual game" typically refers to Tsuji-ura, an ancient Japanese divination ritual turned urban legend played at a lonely intersection after dark.
What You Need
A wooden comb
A cloth or mask to cover your face
Darkness (play at night, ideally midnight)
An empty, quiet crossroads
How to Play
Find a Crossroads: Go to the middle of an empty intersection after dark.
Make the Comb Speak: Run your fingers lightly across the teeth of the comb to make a soft rattling sound.
Recite the Chant: Repeat this phrase out loud three times: "Tsuji-ura, tsuji-ura, grant me a true response."
Cover Your Face: Place your cloth or mask over your face so nobody can see your expression.
Wait for a Stranger: Stand quietly and wait for a random passerby to approach.
Ask Your Fortune: When someone walks near, ask them to tell you your fortune or answer your burning question.
Observe the Result: If they give a strange, cryptic, or terrifying answer, you have your reply. Do not follow them or look back as you leave.
I don't know if this belongs here, and honestly, I don't care if most of you don't believe me.
If I had read this from someone else four years ago, I would have rolled my eyes and called it fiction too. That's probably what you should do. It would be better for you if you did.
I found the crossroads game during one of those late-night internet spirals where one creepy post turns into ten open tabs, and suddenly you're reading about rituals people swear are fake right up until someone vanishes.
Back then, I loved that stuff. Ghost stories. Haunted roads. Old games with rules that sounded too specific to be invented.
But I didn't believe in any of it.
Not really.
I wish I had stayed that kind of person.
I wish I had read the rules, laughed, and gone to sleep.
Instead, I told Jenny about it.
Jenny was my fiancée. More than that, she was the one person I never had to explain myself to.
We grew up together. We started dating young. Somehow, despite all the ways life tries to pull people apart, we stayed together for almost fifteen years.
Everyone said we were one of those couples that just made sense. The kind people assume will end up married because it feels stranger if they don't.
I proposed when I was twenty-eight and she was thirty. She said yes before I finished asking.
Our families acted like we were rushing, which was ridiculous, but we didn't want the engagement to start with arguments, so we tried to keep everyone happy.
We looked at venues. We talked about guest lists. We argued over colors for maybe ten minutes and then laughed because neither of us actually cared that much.
We were happy.
I need you to understand that.
We were happy.
On the way home from touring one of the venues, I brought up the crossroads game.
That was normal for us. We talked about creepy things the way other couples talk about TV shows.
The rules said you needed a wooden comb, something to cover your face, and an empty crossroads after dark.
It also said not to do it anywhere familiar. Not near home. Not somewhere someone you know might pass by.
Find a place you can walk away from and never return to.
We ignored that part.
There was a rural intersection not far from the venue, surrounded by fields and low hills. No streetlights. No nearby houses that we could see.
Just road, grass, and darkness pooling in every direction.
We made jokes because that's what people do when they're nervous and don't want to admit it.
Then we played rock, paper, scissors to decide who went first.
The ritual had to be done alone, but one of us would wait near the car in case something happened.
I won.
Jenny went first.
I still hate myself for smiling when I won.
She took the comb and walked into the middle of the road.
She covered her face.
She said the chant.
Then she waited.
I stayed by the car, close enough to see her but far enough away that I could pretend we were following the rules.
Nothing happened at first.
No wind.
No passing cars.
Not even the sound of insects, which I only noticed later because the silence out there felt too complete.
Jenny just stood there with the mask over her face, one hand curled around the comb.
Then someone appeared on the road.
I don't mean I saw them walking from a long distance away.
I mean one moment the road beyond the crossroads was empty, and the next there was a person coming toward her.
Slow.
Steady.
No flashlight.
No hesitation.
I almost called out, but the rules said only the person doing the ritual could speak.
So I stood there and watched my fiancée ask a stranger if they were the fortune teller.
They didn't answer.
That should have been the end of it.
The rules were clear about that too.
If they don't answer, you leave.
You do not ask again.
You do not follow.
You definitely do not get angry.
Jenny asked anyway.
"Am I going to be happy with my life?"
I remember feeling embarrassed by the question, then hurt, then scared, all in the span of maybe two seconds.
We were getting married.
Why would she ask that?
The figure murmured something.
I couldn't hear it, but Jenny could.
I know she could because her whole body changed.
Her shoulders dropped.
Her head tilted like she was trying to understand something she wished she hadn't heard.
Then she said:
"Wait. That was a dumb question. Am I going to be successful in life?"
The figure murmured again and kept walking past her.
Jenny followed.
I wanted to yell.
I wanted to run after her.
I swear I did.
But my body wouldn't move right.
It was like the dark had weight and it was pressing me into the ground.
Jenny demanded an answer.
That was when the figure spoke loud enough for me to hear.
"Take off the mask."
I can still hear it.
Not because it was loud.
Because it sounded close.
Like it had been said directly into my ear.
Jenny knew the rule.
Everyone who reads about that game knows that rule.
You do not take off the mask until it's over.
She asked:
"Why?"
The figure kept walking.
Then Jenny ripped the mask off her face.
The figure stopped.
It turned back toward her.
It smiled.
Then it pointed at me.
I don't remember hitting the ground.
I don't remember anything after that until I woke up in daylight with a shotgun in my face.
There was a man standing over me, yelling that I was trespassing.
My tongue felt thick.
My head hurt.
My watch said 3:00 a.m., but the sun was up.
Not sunrise.
Full daylight.
Then I remembered Jenny.
I got up so fast the man nearly pulled the trigger.
I started screaming her name.
I told him my fiancée had been standing in the road.
I told him we had been playing a stupid game and something had come toward her.
He looked at me like I was sick.
Then he said:
"Son, I checked before I came out here. Looked through binoculars from the house."
He paused.
"You were alone. Passed out beside your car."
I kept saying no.
I kept telling him Jenny was real, that she had been with me, that she was wearing the mask.
He told me there had been no woman.
No girl.
No one in the road.
Just me.
I don't remember everything after that clearly.
I remember accusing him of lying.
I remember crying.
I remember him lowering the shotgun once he realized I wasn't on drugs or pretending.
I remember him saying we needed to call the police.
They searched for her.
Fields, ditches, tree lines, roadside drainage, nearby properties.
They checked cameras miles away.
They pulled phone records.
They interviewed friends, family, people at the venue, anyone who had seen us that day.
Jenny was gone.
Not missing in a way that made sense.
Gone like something had removed her from the road and forgotten to leave evidence behind.
That was four years ago today.
They never found her phone.
They never found blood.
They never found clothes, footprints, hair, or anything else.
Her family still looks at me like I know more than I'm saying.
Maybe I would too.
I dream about her all the time.
She is always walking away from me into a building I don't recognize.
Sometimes it's a church.
Sometimes it's a hospital.
Sometimes it's a house with no windows.
I run after her, but the hallway stretches.
I call her name until my throat hurts.
She never turns around.
Lately, the dreams have changed.
Last week, she stopped at the door before going inside.
She didn't look back, but she raised one hand and pointed over her shoulder.
At me.
I know what some of you are going to say.
Go back.
Do the ritual again.
Ask what happened.
Ask where she is.
Maybe I deserve whatever answer I get.
Maybe that's why I'm writing this.
Because part of me thinks I'm going back tonight.
And if I don't update this:
Do not try the crossroads game.
Do not test it.
Do not treat the rules like suggestions.
Some rituals are just stories.
Some stories are traps.
And some warnings are written by people who are still being followed.
