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t all started with an email in her junk folder. The subject heading read: Hey Nicole . . . So You’re Moving to Little Rock. She couldn’t figure out who it could be from. She’d only found out about her husband’s job transfer yesterday. They hadn’t even told family or friends yet. It was going to be shock to everyone, leaving Chicago for Little Rock, Arkansas. But the opportunity was tremendous for her husband, Brad; a pay raise beyond their imaginations and a new job title that would bump him up into the upper management level. He was only thirty-one years old and had been with DataQuest for seven years.
She ignored it at first and then at the last minute decided to open it. It might be something DataQuest had sent along; a friendly note from the relocation department.
The note was friendly in tone but overall generic. She quickly realized it was spam. But, before hitting delete something caught her eye. It was from an online real estate company. She and Brad talked about buying a house last night when they discussed the job transfer.
She’d heard a lot about people saving thousands of dollars buying and selling properties through online services, by eliminating the real estate agent fee. She clicked on the link. It sent her to a very professional, clean and impressive website. It listed featured properties in Little Rock and had a search option with different categories to choose from. The featured properties were gorgeous. In fact, they were exactly the kind of home she and Brad had talked about buying.
They were excited about buying a house. They’d lived in a condo for eight years. They knew Little Rock real estate was cheap compared to Chicago. But they also knew this job was temporary. Probably just a few years and then they’d be back in Chicago. So they weren’t going to spend a lot of time figuring out what to buy. Nicole thought this was a perfect chance for her to get a jumpstart on the house hunt. A pop-up window filled the upper right of the screen. A cartoon-looking ghost floated next to the pop-up box.
The text read: Hey Nicole. Here are some properties that were especially chosen for YOU. And there were three houses. Victorian cottage houses. 3 bedrooms, 2 bath, hardwoods, updated, all new appliances, security system, in a historic downtown neighborhood. This is perfect, she thought, clicking on the picture. The house was a vibrant blue color.
“This is it,” she said, smiling. She called Brad and told him she had something to show him when he got home.
That night Brad said, “Get it. I think it’s great.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I trust you. It’s perfect. I’ll be two miles from our downtown headquarters. This is great. What a beautiful house.”
“That was easy.”
“It was,” he said, walking into his office. It was only 7:30 and he was already getting a jump on tomorrow’s work. She sent the online real estate company an email and picked up her used paperback and started reading where she’d left off earlier.
The next morning a representative from the company emailed back and gave her a phone number to call. Nicole called and said she’d love to see the house and said she’d fly down next week to see it before they decided for sure. The representative said, “I can’t wait to meet you.”
The plane flight was on time and everyone at the Little Rock airport was friendly and the car rental agent gave her detailed – more details than she needed – instructions on how to find the Quapaw neighborhood where the house was located.
She found it and it looked exactly as the pictures had shown. She got out of her car and walked around the property. An elderly woman was sitting on the porch at the house next door. Nicole waved and the woman came down from the porch.
“Hello, I’m Sherry,” the woman said.
“Nice to meet you, Sherry. My name is Nicole.”
“Ain’t you a pretty thing.”
Nicole blushed. “Thank you.”
“So,” Sherry said. “Are you going to buy this house?” They both looked at it. It dawned on Nicole that there wasn’t a For Sale sign out front.
Nicole smiled proudly. “I think we will, if everything checks out.”
“We?”
“Me and my husband, Brad. He’s in Chicago. That’s where we live now. We’ll be moving down here.”
“Oh,” she said. “I love Chicago. It’s a beautiful city.”
“Yes, we like it a lot.”
“I hope you do decide to buy this house. It’s been for sale for almost four years now.”
Nicole’s expression changed. “Really?”
“Yes, it seems like they’re bringing somebody by here every other week looking at it. Frankly, there’d been a few folks looking at it that I’m glad they didn’t buy it. I know that sounds ugly but sometimes you can sense these things. Like I know you and your husband will be terrific neighbors. Now, he works at DataQuest, right?”
“Yeah. How’d you know that?”
“Oh, good guess.” She winked at Nicole.
Nicole pointed at the house on the other side. “Who lives there?”
Sherry thought for a moment, “The Andersons. But they’re never here. They own homes in several places, Florida and Oregon. They only spend two weeks a year here, around Christmas.”
“Oh,” Nicole said, mentally adding that to her shortlist of additional features.
“Well, I’d better get back inside. I won’t keep you. I just hope you all get it.”
Nicole turned to watch an approaching car and said, “I just can’t imagine why so many people have looked at the house and no one has ever bought it.” When she turned back towards Sherry, she was gone, already back up on her porch, sitting in her chair, watching.
A small, two-door Honda pulled up. It was beat-up and had a huge dent over the left rear tire. A woman got out. Nicole didn’t expect a woman. She threw her cigarette into the street and it rolled away, still lit.
“Nicole?” she shouted.
“Uh, huh. That’s me.”
“Hi. I’m here to show you the house.” She held up a key, showed it to Nicole, like it was proof. Nicole nodded and followed her up to the house. The woman actually looked more like a girl, maybe seventeen or eighteen. The girl unlocked the house. She carried no paperwork or anything, just the key.
The girl pointed inside the house, inviting Nicole in with a gesture.
“Wait a second,” Nicole said. “Who are you? I talked to a man. His name is—”
“Steve Lancaster. That’s my dad. He couldn’t make it. Something came up.”
Nicole sighed, crossed her arms.
“Look. You want to see the house or not? I don’t care either way.” The girl closed the door and put the key in it and started to lock it.
“No. No. That’s fine. Let’s see it. Might as well.”
They walked inside. The girl said, “I doubt my dad even had anything that came up. I think he’s so tired of showing this house he sent me out here. It’s a waste of his time. He’s been trying to sell it for a long time.”
Nicole walked through the house, checking out the bedrooms, bathrooms, matching up the description and online pictures with what she saw. She said, “This is definitely the house we saw online.”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” the girl said, lighting a cigarette.
“Because sometimes you hear about people misrepresenting things on the internet.”
The girl smoked and didn’t offer a rebuttal.
“Do you mind putting that out?” Nicole said.
“Why? It’s not your house.”
“Well, I think it’s going to be. I’d really like to buy a house that is smoke-free.”
“Whatever.” She went into the bathroom and dropped it into the toilet and flushed.
Then something startled Nicole, something she hadn’t noticed before. It was a door. She pulled on it. It was locked. She turned to the girl. “I don’t remember seeing this in any of the photos. Is there a basement in the house?”
“No, why?”
“This door. What’s this door connected to?”
“I think it’s a closet.”
“It’s locked.” She pulled on it again.“Or a pantry.”
“Do you have a key for it?”
“No. I think it’s a storage room. A locked storage room. I’ll ask my dad about it.” She walked back down the hallway to the front door. “Are you done?”
The girl locked the house. Nicole said, “What’s your name?”
She hesitated, like she had to think about it. “Deborah.”
“Deborah? You don’t look like a Deborah.”
“They call me Deb or Debbie.”
“Well, tell your dad we want it. Or I guess I’ll call him.”
“Okay,” she said and then hurried to her car.
“Hey,” Nicole shouted. The girl spun around, annoyed. “What?”
“How’d your dad or his company know that we were moving to Little Rock?”
“What do you mean?” She played with her lighter, continually flicking it.
“I mean I got an email from you all.”
“That’s what they do. They send out email blasts and spam senders and mass mailers. Marketing stuff. I don’t know how it works.” She lit a cigarette.
“Yeah, but it had my name on it. And it knew we were moving to Little Rock before we had even told anyone.”
“The companies keep all that information online, people moving, relocating. There’s a way to access that and get to people very quickly.”
“That’s scary.”
“That’s what your husband will be doing over there,” she pointed at the tallest building downtown, just barely visible over the tops of the trees, “at DataQuest. What do you think they do? Add up little old ladies savings accounts for them? Hell no. Its data management, data manipulation, data marketing, all of it.”
“Yeah,” Nicole began, “but they have laws and rules they must follow. It’s not how you’re making it sound.”
“Some day you’ll be taking a shit and an ad will pop up on your cell phone for toilet paper. Or you’ll be shoving your last tampon up inside you and your computer will print out coupon for a box of tampons at Wal-Mart.” She took another drag then tossed the cigarette to the ground and got in her car.
When she got back to Chicago she withheld the details of her conversation with the neighbor and the girl, Deb. She told Brad the house was everything they’d hoped for. He was happy and told her again, “Get it. Buy it.”
“But you’ll need to go down to Little Rock and do some of the paperwork.”
“Can’t they do all of that online, email, fax, whatever.”
“Apparently not. I talked to Steve Lancaster, the agent, and he said we both had to be present.”
“Hmm,” he said, typing on his computer. Nicole stood in his office and patiently waited for him to finish. His office was bare except for his desk, a file cabinet, two computers and a poster of the Chicago Bears football team.
He looked up at her, “I’m sorry. What were you saying?”
“I said you need to fly down to Little Rock with me so we can buy this house.”
“Can’t we do this—”
“I just told you, no! We both have to be there in person.”
“Oh, okay. Fine, book us a flight.”
The following Friday afternoon they flew to Little Rock. Steve Lancaster told them not to bother with a rental car, he’d pick them up, take them to their hotel, chauffeur them around until they flew out the following day, a mid-afternoon Saturday flight. In and out, no one would even know they’d been gone.
They stood in the airport for a few minutes looking around when Steve Lancaster introduced himself. They all three shook hands. Steve told them to follow and they stepped outside and got into his car that was parked in one of the short-term spots. It was a black Lincoln Town Car. The inside of the car smelled like cigarette smoke and fried food. Brad searched the car suspiciously as Steve drove. They both sat in the back seat. Steve stood at the same height as Brad and probably hovered around two hundred pounds. He was muscular and looked more like an oil field roughneck than a real estate agent. He imagined that Steve got into real estate by way of one of those late night informericals: Are you making $12,000 a month working part-time? If not, call now!
He laughed at this thought, Nicole looked over at him. “What honey?”
“Oh, nothing,” he said, patting her on the leg.
He trusted Nicole in her assessment of the house and the price was unbelievable. A steal. Literally a steal. It was priced 40% less than similar properties in the neighborhood. He’d done some research. He didn’t share with Nicole what he’d found out. How the house was cheap, even too cheap. Even though it sounded too good to be true, he kept his mouth shut, eager to snatch it up. Also, he’d kept it a secret that he’d been in touch with Steve himself. They’d had two telephone conversations before coming to Little Rock.
They were both surprised that Steve didn’t say much. He offered the usual small talk: How was the flight. Nice day today. That kind of thing. But as they drove he seemed content watching the road and answered his cell phone and told the caller, “They’re in the car.”
They exited off the highway and meandered through residential areas. Brad finally spoke up, asking him how long he’d been selling real estate.
Steve’s eyes peered into the rearview mirror, “About six or seven years,” and went back to his driving.
“What did you do before real estate?”
“Little of this and that.”
“Right.”
Nicole squeezed Brad’s knee, a gesture to relax him. She could feel him tensing up, a little nervous. “So,” he began, “are you from around here?”
“Oh, no,” he said.
“I wondered. I didn’t detect a southern accent. You sound more Midwestern to me.”
“Good guess,” Steve said, “I’m from Ohio. Cleveland.”
Brad was encouraged by Steve’s willingness to answer questions and their shared geographical heritage. “I’m originally from Dayton,” Brad said. Steve just nodded.
Some of his tension began to evaporate.
Nicole cleared her throat. “I met your daughter last week. Deb or Debbie. She’s a very sweet girl.”
“Who?” Steve said.
“She said she was your daughter, Debbie?”
“Oh, yeah. You said she’s sweet? You think so? I don’t think so.”
Brad and Nicole looked at each, laughing. Steve watched them in the rearview.
Nicole said, “Why do you say that?”
“She’s a teenager. She’s a girl. She’s a pain in the ass.”
“She said that you’ve been trying to sell this house for awhile now.”
Brad glanced over at Nicole. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“I didn’t?”
“No.” He lowered his voice. “How long has it been up for sale?”
Steve’s voice sailed between them, causing both of them to turn at the same time and look. He was cussing out a driver. “Asshole can’t figure out if he wants to go straight, left or right.” He hit the horn again. Brad and Nicole searched the road for the culprit but found no one. Who was he honking at?
They didn’t say anything else until they got to the house.
Brad couldn’t help but smile when he saw it. It looked even better in person. Nicole searched the house next door for any sign of Sherry. She mentioned her to Brad and was hoping she’d be around. When she quit looking for her she glanced up at the house and saw Brad and Steve waiting on her. They were both staring back at her.
“This is it,” Steven said holding the door open. “After you.”
Inside Brad immediately hit all the rooms, glancing at them quickly. He met Nicole in the hallway. She was beaming with excitement. “Isn’t this adorable?”
Brad smiled and looped an arm around her shoulders and gave her a squeeze but didn’t say anything. He just nodded; his mind was racing with good thoughts.
“What does the back yard look like?”
“I’ll show you,” Steve said, leading him down the hallway to the back door. There was a deck, newly stained and the back yard was filled with huge oak trees, everything was green everywhere he looked. “It’s beautiful,” Brad said.
“Yeah,” Steve said, unwrapping a stick of gum. “It’s like this nine or ten months out of the year. Sunny and beautiful.” He put the gum in his mouth. “Up in Cleveland it’s like this two or three months a year.” He chewed and finally said, “I’ll take this.”
“Absolutely,” Brad said.
They toured the rest of the house. Brad paid close attention to closet space, square footage of each room, taking notes. He asked about plumbing and other structural questions Nicole didn’t understand. She’d ended up on the back porch, staring at the trees, sky and their soon-to-be backyard. She imagined a few comfortable chairs, a grill and cold drinks.
Occasionally she glanced at the house next door, Sherry’s house, quietly hoping Sherry would see them and come over and meet Brad. What she did see was someone peering out from behind a set of Venetian blinds. There was clearly someone standing there, watching her, perhaps unaware how easily they could be seen. Nicole thought Sherry lived by herself and figured it had to be her. She waved at the figure and then it disappeared.
“There’s one other thing,” Nicole said, interrupting their discussion about financial details. Brad counted out one-hundred dollar bills in groups of ten. From first glance it looked like twenty thousand dollars or even more. “What are you doing?” she said.
“Some creative financing,” Brad said, then winked at her.
“What do you mean?”
“Saving some money. Tax money. Don’t want the grubby hands of our great government taking one more cent than it deserves. We’re under-the-tabling part of the cost of the house in cash. Then there’ll be less to tax . . . nevermind. It’s kind of complicated but don’t worry yourself with it.”
She watched Steve who hadn’t taken his eyes off the money the entire time. He then re-counted what Brad had laid out for him.
“What’s that sweetheart?” Brad said, smiling.
“Huh?”
“You said there’s one other thing.”
“Is this legal?”
“I don’t know,” he said, still smiling and not offering to elaborate.
“Whose idea was this?”
“This great man, right here,” he said, and gave him a strong pat on the back. “Steve and I have talked a few times. He proposed the idea. He pays less taxes, I pay less taxes. We both win. Don’t worry sweetheart. There’s a way to cover this up with layers of paperwork, it’s easy. The government is a bunch of idiots. Anyhow, what was the other thing you wanted to talk about?”
“That door.”
“Which one?”
“Over here, I’ll show you.”
They went through the kitchen and then turned the corner at the hallway. “This one.”
It was a normal looking door. Brad tried to open it. “It’s locked.” He looked at Steve. “What’s this to? Is there a basement?”
“Not that I know,” he said. “Let me see if I have a key.”
They watched him sort through a ring of keys. He shook his head, talking to himself: “Not that one . . . nope . . . nope . . . uhh . . . nope . . . I think maybe this . . . nope.”
Steve dropped the ring of keys back into his pocket. “Let me call Deb and have her bring over my other set of keys.”
“Well, what is it though?”
“I’m not sure,” Steve said.
Brad and Nicole looked at each at the same time. “You’ve never opened it?”
“I might have once. I don’t remember. I deal with a lot of different properties. A lot going on, a deal here a deal there, a house here a house over there. So, no, I actually don’t think I’ve ever opened it now that I think about it.”
“Well,” Nicole began, “we’d like to open it and see what’s in there before we buy it.”
Steve placed the cash money in his briefcase. It wasn’t really a briefcase more like a computer laptop bag. He zipped it up. He said, “I assure you it’s nothing to worry about. I think it’s probably decorative. There’s probably a brick wall behind it and it was ugly so they put a door there.”
“A brick wall?”
Steve flipped open his cell phone and turned from the two of them and talked to someone on the phone but didn’t say Deb. He identified the caller as Frank.
He pleaded for help finding the key and it turned into an argument that lasted for a few minutes until Steve’s angry voice won and stopped the conversation. He hung up and told them that Deb was going to run by the office and see if she could find the key.
“What do we do in the meantime?” Brad said.
“I say he takes us to the hotel, get checked in, grab a bite to eat somewhere and come back later when they find the key,” Nicole said, pleased with her idea.
Brad mulled this over for a few seconds and said, “Sounds good to me. What do you say, Steve. Run us over to our hotel.”
“Sure,” he said, flatly. But he didn’t move; he stood there. Brad and Nicole walked past him to the front door.
“There’s one more thing,” Steve said, at the last moment before they were able to open the front door and leave.
“What’s that?”
“Out back. In the backyard, did you see it?”
“See what?”
“Come on, I’ll show you. It’s a surprise.”
They followed him back down the same hallway they’d traveled a dozen times already and sauntered outside. “It’s under the deck.”
“Under the deck?” Brad’s interest was perked and went to investigate. Nicole started to follow him but stopped and turned around to ask Steve a question when she saw him looking up at Sherry’s house, waving his hand and nodding his head, like he was communicating, or giving a signal.
Brad’s voice brought her out of her contemplation, “Nicole. Come down here. Look at this.”
She slowly walked down the steps and knelt down to see Brad opening a little wooden door, it swung open. “What is it? It looks like a miniature door.”
He was sweating a little and was excited, “It’s a doggie door. Look. It’s a doghouse. We’ve talked about getting a dog.”
“Oh, I see,” she said, unenthusiastically.
“It better not be big enough for you to fit in it,” Steve joked. Through the cracks in the deck she could see him standing there, still looking up at the house.
“Very funny,” Brad said.
Then she heard a familiar voice. It was Sherry. Nicole and Brad stood up and they all said hi and the introductions and small talk went on longer than Nicole felt was appropriate. Sherry had come in through the house. She’d said that she saw the commotion and invited herself over. She beamed, “So, you’re killing me with suspense. Are y’all gonna buy it?”
“Yes, we are,” Brad said, walking off. Steve had summoned him inside. “Be right back,” Brad said.
“Be careful,” Nicole said.
Brad laughed it off. “Be careful? Okay, I will.”
Sherry took both of Nicole’s hands into hers and brought her up close and remarked how beautiful she was and wanted to get a good look at her. “Oh,” Sherry gleamed, “you’ll never age. Look at your skin. You’ll look thirty when you’re forty. You’ll look forty when you’re sixty. Me, I look my age. I’m . . . .”
Nicole said nothing.
“You’ll just have to guess,” she said, “But keep your guesses to yourself.”
Nicole acknowledged the good humored joke and then said she really wanted to get back inside. “We were actually on our way back to the hotel. We’re tired and hungry. You can imagine. We’re just waiting for the final pieces to fall into place and then,” she turned and examined the house, “this beautiful house will be ours.”
“How wonderful,” Sherry said. Then her lips turned downward. “What else are you waiting for? May I ask?”
“There’s a door. It’s locked. No one can get it open and no one seems to know what it is for and what it goes to.”
Sherry nodded contemplatively.
“Hey! Do you have any idea? You may know exactly what it is. You’ve probably been in this house before. Come on, I’ll show you which one I’m talking about.”
“Oh, no, no. I’ve never been in this house.”
“You just came through the house.”
“No,” she said, backing away slowly. “I’ve never set foot in that house.”
Nicole twisted her lips, like she always does when she’s stumped about something. “Well, let me show you anyway. You may have a similar door in your house. Or you may’ve seen one like it before.”
“I doubt it,” she said.
Nicole put her hands on her hips. “Well, how do you know if you haven’t even seen it? Come on inside.”
Nicole walked up the porch steps.
“Wait!” Sherry screamed, “Not yet.”
Just then Steve met her at the back door. He glanced down at Sherry and then looked at Nicole who was standing directly in front of him. Sherry said, “I tried to get her to . . .” her words trailed off like she’d started to say something she wasn’t supposed to.
“It’s okay,” Steve said. “She can come in.”
“Are you sure?” Sherry said.
“Yeah, come on in. It’s ready.”
Nicole went inside and turned to wait for Sherry when Steve closed the door behind her. As he closed it, she saw Sherry run away through the yard.
Then Nicole started down the hallway and stopped. “Hey?” she said, surprised. “It’s open. You got it open.” The door wide open, blocking the hallway. On the other side of the door would reveal the mystery.
Steve was behind her. He said, “Yes, I had the key after all. I’m so sorry about the confusion.”
“Oh, great,” she said, and approached the door. “Let’s see what’s behind door number one.”
What was behind it was nothing. Blackness. A hole that dropped straight down.
“What’s down there?” Nicole said.
“Why don’t you find out?”
She turned around. “What do you mean? You want me to go down there?”
“That’s exactly what I mean,” Steve said. Then he pushed her and she fell backwards watching the lighted entryway of where the door stood get smaller and smaller as she fell. She wondered when she’d hit the bottom because it felt like she’d been falling for a long time. Then she hit something and the falling stopped.
She heard something inside her crack and pop. She was terrified to move. The small light above had disappeared. It was completely black. She blinked repeatedly as if trying to awaken from a dream. With every breath she took she felt stabbing pain flare up throughout her chest. It hurt like fire.
My ribs, she thought. They’re broken. She couldn’t move. Everything hurt. All attempts at movement shot piercing pain through every fiber in her body. She couldn’t begin to try and diagnose her injuries.
There were noises, soft and murmuring. “Hello?” she said. Her voice felt unnatural, strange. She’d never heard her voice sound that way before, distant and not hers.
“Welcome,” a voice said.
“Hello? Where am I? Brad? Brad are you in here? Brad is that you? What is going on?”
She heard several clipped moans and shallow breathing, little creaks of movement, crackling noises, things moving. Then it stopped.
“Is Brad the one that came down . . .” the voice struggled. “Before you?”
“Who are you?” Her voice was stronger. “What are you talking about? Where are you? I can’t see anything.” She felt with her hands but felt mostly cool mush of some sort, like a cold stew, soggy and coagulated with fat. Nicole managed to twist her head a little in the direction from where she thought the voice had come from.
“I’m hurt,” Nicole said. “Are you hurt too?” Then she waited. She called out Brad’s name several more times, pausing a few seconds each time before she yelled his name again. She noticed the louder she yelled her voice ricocheted off the walls, an echo. They were in some kind of very large and cold room.
“We’re all hurt,” the weak voice said. “The lucky ones are dead.”
A charge of panic swam through Nicole’s body. A new reality set in. Something changed; something very wrong had opened up before her eyes. Her brain, her mind, nothing could shield her from the truth any longer. Her fate was what it was, this place, this darkness.
“Where am I?” Nicole said.
“We call it hell.”
“Who is we?” Then she shouted for Brad again.
“No use. I think he was killed on impact. He was lucky. I hadn’t heard anything from him since he fell . . .” the voice trailed off, raspy and into a congested cough. A sick cough like advanced pneumonia, near death.
“Killed. He’s not dead. Brad?”
The voice stopped coughing. “It was too good to be true.”
Nicole listened.
“Too cheap. A great buy. Save thousands on taxes by paying cash for part of it.”
“You tried to buy this house?” Nicole yelled into the darkness.
“We all did. Now look at us.”
The voice resisted and the person fought with it, trying to continue. “The best advice in the world—if it’s too good to be true, it probably is. I ignored it. We all did.”
Nicole said the most natural thing that came to mind. “How long have you been down here?”
“I don’t know. A week, maybe two or three. I don’t know. I was a hefty fellow, over two hundred pounds.” Nicole realized it was a man’s voice. She hadn’t been able to tell. He said, “But now I’m skin and bones. I’m on my way out. Hopefully I’ve only got a few days left. But for you, the horror has just begun.”
“What do you mean?” Nicole snapped.
“What I mean is that you’re well enough to know what’s going on. When I fell down here, I was basically okay. I think my leg was broke and my wrist was sprained or broken but otherwise I was fine. I fought and struggled for days, trying to climb these walls, screaming for help. But no one hears us. Then a voice came through the darkness and explained it all to me. I wasn’t alone. There was someone down here with me. The voice told me that I needed to stay alive long enough to explain it to the next victim. That’s how it worked.”
“And here I am,” Nicole said, finishing it, “the next victim?”
“Right. And you’ll explain it to the next person who falls down here. And it’s strange what you’ll go through when I’m gone and there are no more voices. It’s just you. And when that next person falls down here, you’ll turn into something you weren’t. You’ll be happy. Like I am right now. I’m practically giddy with happiness. You know why?”
Nicole closed her eyes, trying to block the voice out.
“This is the happiest I’ve ever been in my entire life.”
Inside her head she heard the hum of blood rushing through her body. Then it felt like the voice was gone.
“You know why?” the voice said, startling Nicole. She sighed, breathing slowly until she felt warm, wet tears spilling out of her eyes. The initial adrenaline charge from the fall and trauma had worn off and she was in more pain than she could handle. She lay still, trying to hold still, trying not to move or do anything.
“You know why?” the voice said again. She heard the voice but ignored it. She wanted the voice to go away, wanted the voice to die.
“Because I’m not alone anymore. I won’t die alone. Having you down here is comforting because you’ll suffer the way I did. It’s a good feeling. You won’t think it is and it probably sounds repulsive but it’s really not. It’s normal. It’s human nature. Your time is here, soon you’ll be alone. As long as the bodies continue to drop down here, we all kind of live on in a way.”
“Shut up,” Nicole shouted. “You sick bastard.”
“Goodbye,” the voice said.
“You—I don’t believe you.”
“Don’t worry. You’ll feel happiness one last time and trust me, it’s beautiful.”
It wasn’t long before Nicole struggled to keep her minutes, hours and days straight. It stayed cold and dark for however long it’d been. The pain grew, slowly enveloping her entire body, plucking every nerve, striking every tendon, and pulling every muscle. And all there was left to do was stare straight above, watching, waiting, hoping for the light to reappear.
She didn’t know long it’d take, but she’d wait for however long it took. |
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