by Shannon Kirk
It’s nighttime. Gretchen and Jerry are “out back”—whatever. I’m free to work.
I walk to the nook in one wall, take the piss-yellow porcelain top off the toilet tank, go to the door, and smash as hard as I can into the gold knob. I keep smashing and pounding with all my strength, twenty times I bash; pieces of knob fall everywhere. Once I expose the inner mechanism, I pick and pull using my fingers, my multifunctional jelly pendant head and floaters, and that metal rod thingie that holds the toilet stopper in the tank—which I yanked out. Hopefully the toilet runs over and floods this whole ugly house. Eventually, the pieces of the knob are on the floor within the room, and within the hall—which I see through the empty hole. I open the door. I’m out.
I don’t hesitate. I run to the basement door, flick on the line of lights, run down the stairs and down the lit strip to the closed-off room where she said Old Mr. Snoof slept, and where she’s “hinted” Allen might be. Everywhere outside this lit strip is dark and black, and anything could be hiding.
I have no idea what I’ll find behind this door, but if Allen is in there and he’s hungry or cold or scared, I need to be brave enough to save him. I need to salvage something good from my past. And Allen is all good, only good.
I take a deep breath, close my eyes, and open the door.
Allen jumps on me, and I stumble backward.
“Allen! Oh, Allen! Buddy!” I say, hugging him tight. There’s almost nothing in this room. In the middle is a wooden chair, and on the chair is a stuffed animal beagle, covered in what seems like dried black paint. Or blood? A note card sits on his lap. I don’t trust walking into doorways in this house, so while cradling Allen in one arm, I position sideways and slide one foot inside the closed-off room. My other foot is safely out, and I keep looking over my shoulder to ward off anyone creeping behind and pushing me in. This closed-off space is totally empty, so nobody can pull me in.
I snatch the note and jump back out in three hops. Now I’m standing within Gretchen’s puzzle lab. I won’t let Allen down, so it’s a little awkward trying to open the note card with my nondominant hand. But eventually . . .
Lucy!
You are so smart! You finished all your skeleton puzzles! And, see, I did make good on the reward. You’re reunited with your Allen! Old Mr. Snoof kept him company. Tee hee hee. My stuffed doggo from long ago. Don’t mind the dried blood on him. That’s Mummy’s blood from when that “bad hunter” shot her. Old Mr. Snoof was such good company that day for me. He was supposed to be my new brother’s toy when he was born. But I was playing with him until he wasn’t inside her anymore, and until he wasn’t dumb anymore. Like other babies. I remember wanting Mr. Snoof so bad. I remember him being good company for me. I remember thinking that a stupid baby boy wouldn’t be able to play with a doggo for a long time anyway.
I knew Old Mr. Snoof would be good company for your Allen.
Xo, Gretchen
I drop the note and shake my head, trying to make any sense of this. I know upstairs is blocked by whatever those swinging things are I hear when they leave and after they’ve returned. I know when they come back together at dawn, Gretchen will enter and she’ll come straight to check on me. She’ll say, like she did this morning, “Daddy’s gone for his morning coffee and some snickerdoodles. If you’re good, I’ll give you one. Depends on your progress.”
So I know there’s a window of time when I’m vulnerable, but alone with Gretchen. And I need to both delay her and figure out how she locks the door from the outside, while she’s inside.
My free hand is scraping against her vintage Rockwell scroll saw. I turn to her workstation and inventory the tools here. The wood worktable, the silver scissors. I look again at the scroll saw and recall Gretchen’s lesson about how the saw’s deep throat allows one to turn, turn, turn a mounted picture so as to cut the loops and voids of puzzle pieces.
I grab the silver scissors, arm-bar Allen to my chest, and run upstairs.
I’ve got work to do.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
MOTHER
During the day, Mag sat on her camper roof again, and again demanded and received a proof-of-life call. Check. After that, she allowed herself a three-hour power nap, for she’d need a clear head tonight. And now, dressed again in all black, she awaits the train of captors and captives by hiding high up in a tree, near the trail opening behind the Sabins’ house. It took a lot of hard physical work, camouflaging herself in the shadows, crawling and slinking on in through the gorge side. But she’s here. Her night-vision goggles are strapped on tight. Her legs are strong. No shaking. She’s allowing no emotions to enter her panther brain now.
Here they all come upon the screechy calls of Gretchen Sabin into the hole, Jerry Sabin to her side. First comes Earl topside, next Laura, after painful grunting and yelling at her by Gretchen to move her “busted ass” up the stone stairs “faster, bitch.”
Nobody notices Mag above them watching in the dark canopy, a calculating crow.
They fall into their regular spots: Earl in front, Jerry with his gun and headlamp behind him, then wobbly Laura, and last, Gretchen with her gun and headlamp. Mag starts her stopwatch. She can’t fall in line right now and follow on foot just yet—she’s concerned her footfall will attract them. She must wait and swoop in fast. She watches Laura grab pine boughs and hurl herself forward. Within minutes, the train is no longer in Mag’s line of sight.
At the 15.9-minute mark, Mag runs down the limb of the oak she’s hiding on, jumps to a wide Y crook in the next pine, hops to that tree’s fattest limb, above which is a crosshatch limb upon which she’d installed a rope. She grabs the rope and swings forward as far as it will send her, flying dangerously close to electrical gates between trees below, but keeping aloft with legs out straight, using all her core strength. She drops off, sticking the landing in a soft thud on the trail. Hopping fast forward, a curl of blowing leaves in a train’s wake, her feet are like feathers on a lake. This is why she and Laura had to be timed. To minimize noise. Reduce the period of time in which Mag could be detected.
As she approaches the train entering Heaven’s Knot, she hears Laura coughing, likely to mask Mag’s slight leaf crunching and tree shaking, the noise these two emus might register as something beyond forest wind. And now, at marker 17.2 minutes and entering the crook of Heaven’s Knot, Mag leans far to the side to see Laura kneel, straining her broken legs, reaching around the point-tip tree, feeling under leaves, and extracting a bow and a fistful of arrows. All courtesy of Mag, courtesy of Triple C gear in her camper.
As Laura loads up one arrow and shoves the remainder in the waistband of her ugly, awful sweatpants, Mag choke-holds Gretchen from behind, clapping her mouth with a black-gloved hand. She cranks Gretchen’s scrawny arm, the one with the gun, behind her back, takes the gun, and tosses it to the safer side of the trail, the one spot Mag hadn’t moved a net trap to.
Although choked and muzzled, and much smaller than Mag, Gretchen drags Mag forward enough such that Mag can watch Laura shoot Jerry Sabin square in his watch hand.
The fool is screaming like a newborn out of the birth canal—angry to be forced into this life. He’s not pressing anything on his damn watch; he’s too distracted by the blood spreading on his stupid white glove.
“Earl, get his watch,” Laura shouts as she barrels forward and rams straight into Jerry. In her charge, she grabs the shaft of another arrow, and now that she’s upon Jerry on the ground, she jams hard into another part of Jerry’s hand. The arrowhead stabs through to the ground, so, one, two—that’s two arrows pierced in Jerry’s watch hand—he’s a voodoo doll of himself. Laura pushes in on one while keeping a knee on his chest and another knee on his other arm.
Earl removes Jerry’s watch.
“Go, Earl, run. Run, don’t let him get the watch,” she’s yelling.
Mag is still struggling to contain Gretchen, whose bottled screaming is nonstop under Mag’s hand, as is her unbelievable strength to torque under
the choke and grip. Mag didn’t want to hurt the girl, but she’s going to have to hurt the girl. And she must, at all costs, keep her from pressing anything on her damn watch.
Jerry knees Laura in the tailbone, and she falls to the side. He pulls on the arrows with his free hand so he’s not impaled in the ground, but the arrows remain in his flesh as he rolls away, stands, and screeches something awful, “My hand. Gretchen! Trigger the alarm!”
He kicks Laura in the ribs, jumps on her stomach, and now she’s backside on the ground, like a dumb, upturned turtle. As she gasps for air, because Jerry can’t get around her—she’s blocking Heaven’s Knot—he grabs his fallen gun and runs off the trail to the side, calling out to Gretchen to “Press the alarm, press the alarm.”
A click and a fast swoop, swish up is heard in Jerry’s direction. When Mag looks into the forest off the trail, she sees Jerry’s headlamp high in the canopy. His headlamp gives enough light to reveal Jerry suspended and netted, arrows in his hand. He’s scream-crying a death howl.
“Gretchen, Gretchen. Get help. My hand. Trigger the alarm,” he’s yelling.
Mag removes her choke hold so as to clamp Gretchen’s wrists and begin the work of extracting her watch. But as she does, Gretchen does the unexpected. She stomps Mag’s foot while breaking Mag’s wrist grip by torquing her arm, not pulling away. Self-defense 101. Next, the girl drops to the ground, rolls sideways and then forward beyond Mag, like a course-correcting BB-8. Once clear of Mag’s commanding space, Gretchen pops to standing and sprints back toward the house. She’s still wearing her watch.
Mag jumps over Laura, who’s still panting on the ground, and grabs Jerry’s watch away from Earl. She doesn’t stop to give any more directions. She turns and races toward the Sabins’ house without pause. No pause, no slowing, no hesitation, even when a gunshot fires behind her.
A yelp is followed by Earl screaming, “Laura! No, Laura! My God, Jerry, you shot a woman on the ground. My God, my God, my God. Laura!”
Mag sprints and sprints and sprints, and as she nears the rear of the Sabins’ house, Jerry’s watch begins to shine and vibrate. The screen flashes and text pops up to tell her, “Movement Rear House.” The vibration intensifies with the next brighter flash. “Movement Side House.” Vibration continues with more flashing. “Movement Front House.” Light alarms and vibrations keep flashing warnings. A dome of light covers the brick fortress like a stadium.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
LUCY
I’m standing in the foyer, all the fossils on the walls around me. And parts of the big surprise I’ve created are piled on the floor. I hear the swing click, swing click, swing click of the metal shields. Someone is here. I had anticipated going back up to Gretchen’s room, stealing a pillow, and sleeping here in the foyer beside my surprise, to wait for her until morning. But here she is, back so soon. I think she’s here, but it could be Jerry. Could be both. I don’t know. I actually hope it’s Gretchen Sabin, unless someone else is here and about to save me, but I know nobody’s about to save me. They’d be yelling my name.
Good thing I escaped and did my project as soon as they left at five. My fingers are aching; using those heavy silver scissors was hard work. My hands and fingers vibrate; two hours of cutting with the scroll saw was also hard work.
Someone inserts a key in the knob, turn, click.
Someone inserts a key in the dead bolt, turn, click.
And, sure enough, here she is, Gretchen Sabin, hair frizzing out in clumps. Several locks are not frizzed, just limp and greasy and thin. Her apple-print dress is soiled. Dead leaves stick in her hair and on her pulsing skin. Something’s happened.
She stalls in the doorway, sees the pile I’ve left on the floor.
“Back so soon,” I say. I’m grinning, watching her take in the massacre.
Yelling behind her fills the foyer: Mag yelling, “Lucy!”
Gretchen turns, pulls the door shut, locks the lock, and cranks the dead bolt. Next, she slams her palm on the wall beside the doorframe, and a hidden panel pops. Within the panel are two buttons. She presses one fast, and here again, I hear the swing clicks, swing click, swing click, swing click. And during that noise, the face of her watch flashes. She can control the outer locking with her watch and this panel.
Gretchen doesn’t appear to have any weapons, and I’m so much bigger than she is. So I could barrel into her tiny body and knock her out to get out. But I don’t need to take violent measures. I know how to remove her from the foyer, cool and easy.
Mag pounds the door and screams my name—all of which Gretchen ignores as she turns to the pile on the floor. She flinches. I see the quiver. She flinched. And now she snarls. “What did you do? You fucking whore!”
I’m not sure why I’m a whore for silver-scissoring all the hardcovers off her Grey’s Anatomy books and then cutting each one into puzzle pieces on her scroll saw. Not sure how making a puzzle makes me a whore. But Gretchen hasn’t quite mastered the art of swearing.
“Gretchen. Here are the rules,” I say. Because I know she can’t resist a game or a puzzle. “I won your challenge by breaking out. And now you’re the loser. I’ve scattered all the pieces to your Grey’s Anatomy covers all over the house. Did you know you had two hundred fifty-five copies? First editions and first runs too. Multiples of some editions. I saw the labeling. Rare collection. Wow.”
I lop my head to the side, watch her taking in these facts. Her whole body pulses. Blotches upon blotches of red pulsing.
“Anyway, you should start. You have three hours to find all the pieces. I’d start in the dead room if I were you. I know you like to sort the corner pieces first. So that’s my gift to you, a hint. And then you have eight hours to put all the separate covers back together. Tick, tock, I’ve already started the timer.” I tap my head. “Tick, tock, tick, tock. Get going, Gretchen. Tick, tock.”
Gretchen Sabin cannot resist a challenge or a puzzle. No. She runs down the Death March hallway. I wait until I hear her slamming feet coming back up the earth-puzzle hallway toward the dining room. I run to the front door, scattering the pile of puzzle pieces on the way. I jam a button in the panel, and those three swing clicks swing open.
I’ve unlocked the doorknob, and I’m about to crank open the dead bolt, when from my side, she’s racing toward me. She must have heard me shuffle through the puzzle pieces or heard the shields swinging, and here she is. Damn, this snake is fast. She takes me from the side, and we’ve slid to the middle of the foyer. Grey’s puzzle pieces jam into my back, and pieces stick to our arms.
She’s pinning me, sitting on my stomach, and she has a knife raised high above me. She’s about to double-fist plunge. I should have hidden all the knives in the kitchen.
I wince, I do, I flinch.
But now she’s yanked up and off me and is flying through the air to the far wall. The knife drops and clatters somewhere at my feet. And the sound of Gretchen’s flung body slamming a wall filled with glass-covered puzzles is a loud bang and then the shattering of glass.
Standing over me is Mag, who entered, I don’t know how, and ripped Gretchen Sabin off my body by gripping a clump of her limp, thin hair.
The clump is now in Mag’s hand. That’s how hard she gripped and threw.
Mag, head to toe dressed in black, stomps toward Gretchen, who’s crumpled on the floor, broken glass from framed puzzles all around her. Blood, which drips from where her hair ripped and from a glass shard stabbed in her shoulder, stains her apple-print dress, such that the red apples are bleeding. Mag steps on the knife, bends, picks it up, and throws the bloody clump of hair on Gretchen.
When Mag turns to look down at me, when she offers a black-gloved hand with her long, black-cloaked arm, I think, My mother is the queen of Jennys, so that makes me a Jenny too.
I jolt up.
Gretchen’s not done. Behind Mag, she charges toward us like some rabid beast.
I jump around Mag and recall D’s lesson. With one hand, I punch Gre
tchen in her windpipe, five fingers in a fist, and while she’s stunned and gasping for air, I raise my other hand, intending to choke her out with ten fingers. Five will get you ten, ten will get you killed.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Everything in the last half hour has been insane. First, Mag bolted in and ripped Gretchen’s hair out of her skull while throwing her off me. Next, Mag helped me stand. Next, I performed half of five will get you ten, ten will get you killed, because Mag intervened and said I didn’t need to do the second half—I didn’t need to kill Gretchen. With some minutes now beyond the blowup, I accept Mag made a fair point. I didn’t need to kill her. Next, Mag whipped a plastic zip tie out of her backpack and cuffed Gretchen, while she demanded I run away from the house and call the cops. She handed me her phone. I did what she said, and next thing I knew, I heard Mag dragging Gretchen down the hill. “Tell the cops they rigged the house to burn. I don’t know how.”
Next, the whole entire police force of the world and all of the firemen in the galaxy showed up, at least a billion cop cars and twenty million engines. And now, so soon, news helicopters have mobilized, likely upon all the police-scanner talk of a “Kidnapping at the Sabin Property,” and the need for a “bomb squad,” et cetera.
Firefighters and some GI Joe–type woman, who I swear rappelled in from a cloud upon a bat signal, are huddled with Chief Dyson.
Gretchen Sabin, who was foisted off on the cops as soon as they screamed in here, is long gone in some squad car. I didn’t say goodbye. Good riddance. Some kinder-voiced person in the crowd said something about getting her the mental-health care she needs—after they stem the bleeding. Fine. Whatever. Fine.
Right now, sitting in the camper, someone beyond the bubble of my consciousness, someone in a haze, is talking at me about how paramedics and a child psychologist need to check me. This snaps me awake to my current surroundings.
