Reunion (3 page)

She’s asleep
now
. I can see her chest move. She’s breathing. Thank
God
.

But her arm. Her missing arm. The bandage is caked with rust-colored blood, and her sh
i
rt is torn. I see a mean red streak running from the outer edge of the dirty gauze down into her armpit.
I
t’s thick and
angry
.

I
nfection.

How much more is there?

And then the match dies out.

“Fuck!” I blurt out. The instant darkness has an added layer of terror to it. I never thought I’d be so grateful for a pack of matches. Such a simple thing. Something you take for granted.

But when your life is on the line, it’s the simple things that count.

I reach into my back pocket, find the matchbook, and light another one. As it dies down fast, I realize I need to conserve the matches. They are literally a lifeline. With fire and light as a tool, we have more of a chance to survive.

Without them, we’re in the dark.

I look around the room and spot a cardboard box.
I peel a tiny bit of cardboard off one flap, then light it. I really need two hands to pull off more cardboard, but if I put the lit piece down, it could die out.

Or, worse, catch the entire ro
o
m on fire.

Amy makes a groan of pain that makes me jump.

I have to decide fast.

Erring on the side of risk, I set the burning piece of cardboard down on the shelf, next to the box I’m trying to rip apart, and very quickly tear off a big chunk. I roll it tightly, like a torch, and try to light it.

No luck.

I pick up the small, burning piece and use it to light the way to my purse. For the next few minutes I play a game of holding the flaming piece of cardboard to see vs. setting it down to use my hands.

This isn’t working.

At one point, I glimpse a dark spot of blood at the base of one of the enormous coffee bean bags. It looks like a big pool of coffee crusted at the corner.

Weird.

As I inhale through my nose and hear my own breath grate against my skin, it dawns on me.

That’s
not
coffee.

And that bag is big enough to hold an entire human being.

My breathing quickens. I begin to pant, the room turning into hues of grey and brown, like an oil slick in swirls.

I need light.

I need air.

I need Mark.

I cannot die like this, trapped in a cage and waiting for my fate.

No.

Just no fucking
no
.

I paw through the contents of my purse, just randomly touching things. I don’t have a sense of meaning in anything I do. I just have to act.

In my purse, I find a lip balm. Perfect.

I feel like Girl Scout.
Wax burns when lit. It holds a flame. Lip balm has a lot of wax in it. I take the lip balm stick and turn the base of it, then smear as much of the lip balm all over the inside and the outer edge of the cone of cardboard I create.
 

I
am ignoring the giant coffee bean bag with the stain. If I pretend it isn’t there, I can focus. I can make light. I can give myself
something
.

I try to light it. No luck.

The flame dies out.

Mark.

His name flashes through my head like a prayer.

Where is he? How long have I been down here? How long will it take before he finds us?

And will he find us before the butcher Amy’s been babbling about gets here?

At the thought of the butcher, I grab the matchbook and work on lighting my improvised torch. I use up three matches in a row before it finally lights.

I could cry tears of joy right now. I did it.

But I have so much more to do before we’re safe.

The matchbook only has about ten matches left, and my torch won’t last for very long. The lip balm makes a terrible amount of smoke, and it smells like burning cherries. Maybe someone upstairs will smell the odd scent and come down and investigate.

I return to Amy and hold the torch up high. It’s burning slowly, so I have time.

I walk back to the hatch I found and hold the torch up to it.

It’s a nasty, foul pipe that is lined with a black gel.

And there’s a dead rat about twenty feet into it.

I shiver at the sight of the dead, furry body. My body crawls with creepy tingles and I feel my teeth crack together.

It’s a pipe, though. I’m small enough to fit in it if I wanted to belly crawl. It’s literally the size of an MRI machine at a hospital. I
once
had migraines in high school and the neurologist sent me in for an MRI. The tube
was
claustrophobic. My
fa
ce was an inch from the machine.

That’s how small this hatch is.

But it may be my only hope, dead rat and all.

Amy groans again and I walk over to her. I can see my water bottle now. I walk quickly down the length of the storage room. All I see are boxes on shelves and bags of coffee beans. The boxes are all labeled with business paperwork names. Invoices. Labor. Accounts Payable. Accounts Receivable.

Where’s the one marked Guns? Working Cell Phone? First Aid?
Escape Plan?
 

First aid. Maybe there’s a first aid kit down here.
My mind focuses with pinpoint precision. I have a goal. As long as I create a series of small goals, I can keep moving forward without falling apart.
 

I paw through the shelves in the tiny, fading light from my torch. The boxes are full of nothing but paperwork. They are properly marked. There’s no sign of a first aid kit down here. No food. No water. No light switch, even.

I do find a box filled with tablecloths, all still in their plastic wrappings. Brand new. They look like they were bought from a restaurant supply company. Those could come in handy. As I open the box, my hand brushes against something hard behind it.

Glass.

I run over to the torch by Amy and bring it closer.

I
t’s a bottle of vodka, half consumed.
Huh. Someone who works at the coffee shop is hiding their alcohol problem.
 

“Something,” I say in a sigh. “It’s something.” No, I don’t need to get drunk. And alcohol is the last thing Amy needs to drink right now. It thins your blood.

But it’s also an antiseptic. If we are down here for too long, I can pour it on her shoulder socket and at least try to manage her infection.

Finding the bottle of vodka gives me hope. What else might I find down here?
I pull the boxes away from the wall.
 

SNAP!

I jump back and scream. I drop the torch. It fizzles out, leaving me jumping in my skin. What was that sound?

Amy groans and moves around. She stops. Then I hear the unmistakeable scrabbling sounds of a rodent.
It goes on and on. This isn’t a mouse or a rat moving stealthily in the corners.
 

This is the sound of a desperate animal.

I have to bend down to get the torch. What if the thing is on the floor, though, moving?
My agitation takes on human form. It feels like my identical twin, living right under the surface of my skin.
 

As I take a step forward something brushes against my forehead.

I scream again.

“Is he here?” Amy moans. “I want my arm! I want my
mo
m!” Her voice is weaker and weaker. I stand there, blind and filled with adrenaline that pumps through me like a firehose turned on high.

Mark.

Oh, please. Please, God, send Mark here. Now. Please.
Please please please
.

I force myself to feel on the ground for my half-burnt torch. I find it, then open my matchbook. In the dark, I count nine more matches.

I light the torch.

And then there were eight.

A quick search leads me nowhere, but now we have tablecloths as blankets and alcohol. It’s better than nothing. I walk over to Amy and cover her with a tablecloth and place a folded one under her head.

I ignore the sounds of struggle coming from whatever creature is making those brushing sounds.

Finally, though, I have to go look.

It’s a mousetrap. A mouse is caught, wriggling less and less.
I
ts eyes are glassy and it’s panting, the life slowly draining out of it.

I look at Amy.

I look at the mouse.

I look at Amy.

I look at the mouse.

I look at Amy.

I can’t look at the mouse
again
.

“MARK!” I scream.
It’s useless. I know that. But if I don’t do something I will go mad. Insanity is a lot easier to understand now. When all you have is your mind and it gets to run wild on you, you can be fucked.
 

The shuffling sounds stop.

I look at the mousetrap. The mouse is dead.

I start laughing.

The sound is that hysterical giggle that comes from a place of deep horror. I remember a book Elaine used to read, called
Flowers in the Attic
. I babysat Mikey a long time ago and after he was asleep, I read it. At one point, the children who were trapped in the attic had no food. They captured mice on purpose and ate them.

My stomach twists, and yet there’s a strange, psychotic comfort to knowing we have meat.

“NO!” I shout. “THIS IS NOT HAPPENING!” I can’t let myself even think like that! How disgusting. My mind is
berserk. I’m out of touch with reality. I’m so terrified of dying and of Amy dying that I can’t stop unraveling.
 

And that’s when this becomes even more dangerous.

When I stop being rational.

“
Carrie! Wha’s wrong?” Amy mumbles. I go to her. She’s drenched in sweat. It’s cool down here, so that means only one thing.
 

Her infection is getting worse.

She smells like urine, too. I realize my own bladder is starting to get uncomfortable. All that coffee when I was upstairs.

It feels like a different lifetime.

Allie. I’m sure Allie just left and hasn’t even gotten back to Los Angeles by now. When will someone realize I’m missing? Will they ever find me?

And Mikey. He’s the one who put me in here. Why? Who is he working with?

A c
h
ill makes me shiver at the same time my need to pee grows stronger.
I can’t believe my friend and I are about to die and all I can suddenly think about is how I don’t want to have to pee on the floor of the storage room.
 

This is ludicrous.

Then again, so is most of the human body.

I take the torch, ignoring the
now-
dead mouse, and walk past the hatch I opened earlier. I go to the very end of the room and do my business in the corner. I feel like an animal. A red rage cloud fills my mind as I think about Mikey’s face as he closed the hatch. Asshole. If I get out of here alive, I’m killing him. I don’t care if he’s Elaine’s pride and joy.

He’s dead.

If.

I just thought
if
. If I get out of here alive. Not
when
.

My knees go weak, right in front of the hatch, as I process that thought. The flame is getting low. The lip
b
alm has burned off. If I don’t get it together, we’ll be right back where we started a few minutes ago, with no light source.

O
n a lark, I go back to the box with the tablecloths and grab one more. Maybe we can use it for—

My hand hits something hard in the box. I pull it out.

Two miniature glass vases.

Well, now, hey.
If we’re going to die, a
t least we’ll go out in style.

Wait.

T
hose aren’t vases.

T
hey’re
candleholders
.

I pull the box off the shelf with a loud thump, eager with what this implies. I search and pull every single item out of the box. When I get to the bottom, I hit pay dirt.

Candles.

Candles.

There is a box of twelve long taper
candles
in there.

“WOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOO!” I cheer, jumping up and down like I won the lottery. Which I did. I rip open the plastic packaging and, with one shaking hand, light the wick off the dying torch.

Flume!
It lights.

Using an old technique I saw Dad do when I was a kid, I take a second candle and melt the bottom of it, then, I use the melted bottom to stick it to the concrete ground and hold it until the wax cools.

I light it.

I use the candle holders to put two more in place. Four lit candles is enough. I blow out the one in my hand. Three works. I have no idea how long I’ll be here.

I have a half a bottle of vodka. Table cloths. Twelve candles. A half a croissant. Two cough drops. A half a water bottle.

And Amy.

“Carrie,” she groans. “It hurts. Oh, God, it hurts.”

I rush to her, grateful for the candlelight now. I feel her forehead. She’s burning up.

My purse contains ibuprofen. Time to use it. I shake two out and give them to her with water. She gulps it down,
then gags
.
The pills stay down, though.
 

“I need to look at your wou
n
d,” I whisper, brushing her wet hair from her forehead.

All she can do is nod.

With careful fingers, I peel back the nasty gauze bandage. The flesh is a strange
combination of bright red, oozing blisters and a burnt color, with thick spots of a lighter tan.
 

And then there are the red streaks, going down into her armpit. It’s her right arm. Amy is right-handed. If this were her left arm, the streaks would go directly over her heart.

“They burned it,” she whispers. “Cauterized it.”

The thicker tan sections cover what must have been the actual bone. The ball-and-socket joint? I struggle to remember. I never took more than high school anatomy. I feel incredibly stupid right now. My medical skills are about on par with an eighth grade
kid
.

That’s the last time I took my Red Cross First Aid certification.