Silent Treatment
Page 30
They reached the point where Sarah had left the path. Sarah stopped, Ben looked around slightly puzzled.
'We have to go off the path for a while,' said Sarah.
'Is that wise, I mean I seem to remember somewhere it is never a good idea to leave the path, ‘said Ben.
'I know, I thought the same thing, but we don't really have a choice.'
Ben nodded and said 'After you then.'
Sarah led the way off the path. As she forced her way through the undergrowth she realised how lucky she had been to find this. It seemed almost inconceivable that she would find it by chance. After several minutes of pushing through the undergrowth, the image from Sarah's drawing came into partial view.
Moments later, they were both standing in front of it.
'I never thought I would actually see this,' said an impressed Ben.
He was standing there looking at a strange, almost deformed, tree that looked uncannily like a stooping person, and surprisingly similar to the drawing that Sarah had shown him.
Ben looked at Sarah. She seemed to have a far away expression on her face. She turned and started to force her way through the undergrowth and deeper into the forest. Ben followed at a discrete distance.
The path really was a distant memory now. As Ben looked down at his feet all he could see was detritus from the trees and a mixture of tangled undergrowth and loose soil. He was finding it hard to stand upright at all. He looked up to see Sarah pushing ahead with a new burst of energy.
He had come this far, and whatever it was that they were stumbling towards, he wanted to be a witness to it.
He thought about asking Sarah what she was hoping to find, but when he tentatively asked her she didn't reply. It was possible that she hadn't heard him, but even more possible he thought that she didn't want to answer any questions.
They trudged on in silence.
And then, without warning Sarah stopped dead in front of him. He had been looking down at his feet at the time and careered into Sarah's back. She didn't seem to notice. She was staring straight ahead of her.
As Ben shuffled alongside he could see that Sarah's expression was one of amazement. He opened his mouth to say something, but he couldn’t find the words. In fact he doubted what his own eyes were seeing.
Ben looked ahead at a large clearing that seemed to have miraculously appeared in front of them. After having been seemingly trapped in an endless forest all day, that was a shock. But it was nothing compared to what they were now looking at. It was like a strange and impossible other world.
Chapter Forty Six
Ben looked out over the clearing. He still couldn’t believe what he was looking at. It wasn’t exactly light here, but after the darkness of the forest he had to clear his eyes. Maybe the bump on the head from earlier was making him see things that weren’t there.
In the midst of the dense, almost impassable forest it was difficult to believe that this could be hidden away. But then he thought of how arduous it had been to find it and how they had relied on Sarah's strange knowledge to find it. And it began to make some sort of sense.
Ben was looking out over what looked like a collection of houses.
As he looked more closely he could see what looked like some sort of a street running down the middle. There were park benches and a bus stop. And it was all completely surrounded by impenetrable forest.
It made no sense, how exactly would there be a bus coming here? How would anyone get here?
He continued to look, but he saw no sign of life.
He wondered if they would be welcomed or chased away if there had been anyone here. He looked again at the bus stop and shook his head.
Sarah hadn't moved.
Ben stood there in silence, taking in everything he could see. And then he saw something that forced him to rub his eyes in disbelief.
Looking past the houses he could see what looked like a post office and a restaurant.
He was lost for words. The whole place was almost impossible to find and completely cut off from the outside world. And yet it had a post office.
He was about to say something to Sarah when something happened to make them both jump.
The door of one of the houses slowly opened.
Ben braced himself, ready to run back into the safety of the woods.
The door swung fully open. But no person emerged.
And then suddenly a small shadow emerged quickly out of the door and Ben started to tense, ready to run. The shadow hurtled towards them; Sarah remained motionless. As it got closer Ben felt embarrassed about being afraid.
A small dog appeared in front of them and proceeded to eye them nervously, before scurrying past them and into the forest.
Eventually Sarah began to walk forwards and Ben decided to follow.
As Ben walked slowly ahead, he thought that the layout of the buildings was reminiscent of a small village. There were four houses that he could see and they were arranged along what he presumed would be called “Main Street” in a normal village. The central road was also perfectly straight. But as their feet moved from grass to the road surface, Ben noticed that it was pretty roughly made. He couldn't imagine any substantial traffic driving down here. But then how could it?
He stopped and stood facing down the road. The road stretched ahead of him and just before it reached the edge of the thick woodland it stopped.
There was no more road. It just ended.
What exactly could possibly drive along that road?
He looked around to see that Sarah had got quite far ahead of him. Ben walked quickly to catch up; she was standing outside the door of one of the houses. She seemed fixed to the spot. Ben walked until he was beside Sarah and waited again for her to move. She stood perfectly motionless.
Ben could wait no longer. He leant forward and slowly turned the handle on the door until the door swung noiselessly open. He turned to say something to Sarah and she turned her head slowly towards him until she was looking directly at him.
But she wasn't really looking at him at all. Her face was completely expressionless and her eyes were glassy and looking past him into some other place.
Ben looked through the doorway. He could see two chairs and part of a small coffee table. He desperately wanted to see what else was there, but he was reluctant to push past Sarah to get in the room. He stood there, waiting.
Eventually, Sarah started to move forward into the room, it seemed to Ben that she had been wrestling with some dilemma; and it had suddenly been resolved. He followed her into the house.
The room looked remarkably ordinary. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but considering how they had arrived here and its strange location, he wasn’t prepared for its complete ordinariness.
What he did notice was the complete lack of a television; not even a radio. There was also a complete lack of any magazines or newspapers.
He was disappointed; there was nothing here that he could see that would have a date on it.
There was also a complete lack of any photos on the walls.
Ahead of him was a closed door. He turned to Sarah and said 'I'll just have a look through here shall I?'
Sarah didn't react. Ben wondered if she hadn't heard him but as he headed towards the door she said 'Be careful.'
Her tone was so unsettling that it made him stop. He hadn't considered that he would need to be careful at all. The place seemed deserted, but with a new sense of apprehension he turned the handle of the door.
The door swung open smoothly.
He glanced nervously around the room; but it was empty of people. It was clearly the kitchen. In the middle of the floor was a table and chairs. On the table there were place settings for four people, the plates containing the remnants of half eaten food.
Ben jumped as he felt something brush his arm.
He had forgotten Sarah was there and she was now standing beside him.
'Looks like they didn't have time to do the dishes,' said Ben.
The room was bathed in light.
'What the…' said Ben.
Sarah's expression didn't change.
In the far corner of the room there was a smaller door; Ben hadn't noticed it when he came in.
'Wonder where that goes?' he said.
He turned the handle and was disappointed as it resisted. He tried to turn it harder, but it was locked.
Ben opened one of the kitchen cupboards and was surprised that they were full of tins of various foods. Between them they opened all the cupboards and as they stood there looking at the array of food Sarah tuned to Ben and said ‘There’s everything we could need here.’
Ben laughed ‘If we wanted to live here of course.’
He noticed that Sarah wasn’t laughing.
Sarah turned and started to walk back through the front door.
As they emerged from the house, Ben noticed that the light was getting poor now.
Sarah turned to him and said abruptly 'I don't want to leave here Ben.'
Chapter Forty Seven
Ben turned and followed Sarah back inside the house. He wasn’t sure she had been serious about staying here for the night. Wherever here was.
As he closed the front door behind him he had a last look outside, but everything seemed to be quiet.
He decided to see if she had been serious and said 'Guess we had better check out the rooms upstairs, if we are going to stay,' said Ben. He left her enough time to respond by saying how she was only joking and of course they would be returning to civilisation. But the look on Sarah’s face suggested that staying wasn’t open to discussion. He would just have to play along until he could think clearly. Anyway, what journalist worth his salt would want to walk away from this story? He also realised that he would have to keep an eye on Sarah, she had a distant look in her eyes that troubled him.
Ahead of them was a short staircase. They started walking up it and their footsteps made a hollow, echoing sound.
'Whoever made this staircase certainly spared all expense,' said Ben. 'My dad would not have been impressed.'
As they reached the top of the stairs and walked out onto a small landing, Ben turned to Sarah and said in explanation 'A joiner. My old man was a joiner.'
There were several doors leading off the corridor.
Ben opened the first door and looked in. 'I guess you could call this the master bedroom.' It was sparsely decorated, with a bed and a bedside table at either side of the bed, and a small dressing table.
Feeling nosy, Ben walked across the room and opened the drawer. It had the usual things you might expect of a man's side of the bed. An electric razor, a book with an action picture on the front and a hairbrush. Ben picked up the book. Whoever stayed here wasn't an avid reader. It looked completely unread.
As he walked round the bed his foot caught on something metallic.
Ben bent down to look under the bed. He was looking at a large box stashed under there and as he stretched his arm forward he could feel its cold metallic touch. He tried the padlock on the front, but annoyingly it was locked.
Sarah started looking in the drawer at the other side of the bed.
'Anything interesting?' said Ben.
Sarah held up a book with a romantic picture on the cover.
'Not a very imaginative couple are they,' said Ben.
Sarah dumped her rucksack on the floor.
'I guess this is your room then,' said Ben. 'I'll just see what my room is like.'
It turned out that Ben's room was a complete contrast. As he stood at the open door he felt like he had been transported back to when he was fourteen years old. There were posters up with pictures of cars and motorbikes and there were model planes hanging from the ceiling. He had to smile, he had got the best room by a country mile.
He put the rucksack on the floor and flung himself on to the bed.
'Enjoying yourself there?' Sarah said as she put her head around the door.
'You shouldn't be in my room anyway.' said Ben in his best teenager voice.
Sarah managed to adopt a mother’s tone as she said 'Well if you kept it clean I wouldn’t have to. Why don't you tidy up after yourself?'
It was then that they both looked around the room – where would he start? The room was almost completely tidy.
'That's not normal,' said Ben.
'And you think everything else is normal here?' said Sarah.
Ben nodded. 'It fits in then.'
He stood up off the bed and said ‘Best check the other rooms then.’
It turned out that there was only one other room and as Ben opened the door he was struck by the contrast between his room and this. There was an explosion of pink colouring as he opened the door.
‘Glad I chose the other one,’ said Ben and after a quick look round, pausing briefly over the dressing table, they closed the door behind them.
‘A traditional family setup then,’ said Ben.
Sarah looked out of the window and said ‘I wouldn’t fancy our chances of retracing our steps through that wood in the dark Ben.’
Ben joined Sarah at the window and looked out. Reluctantly, he said ‘You’re probably right. Best to stay here tonight then.’
He paused for a second and then said ‘What do you think this place is Sarah?’
‘I’m not entirely sure,’ replied Sarah slowly.
The tone in her voice since they had arrived here suggested to Ben that Sarah knew more than she was saying. Or if she didn’t actually know, at least she had more of an idea than him. It was just that she clearly wasn’t going to share her thoughts with him. Not yet at least.
‘Maybe it will become clearer tomorrow,’ said Ben.
‘Maybe,’ said Sarah, as she turned and headed to her room.
‘Sleep well,’ said Ben as she left.
Sarah shut the door behind her, she instinctively looked around for a chair to wedge up against the door. There was a small chair that would just about fit the bill. As she wedged it up against the door she stopped. Did she really need to do that, here? She hesitated. Maybe if she felt more comfortable she wouldn’t need it, maybe tomorrow. She pushed the chair hard up against the door. As she got into bed she picked up the small bag and put it close to her on the chair next to her bed.
Ben watched Sarah go into her room. As he closed his own door behind him he was feeling bemused. He wasn’t sure what to make of this place. He wasn’t sure if he should feel frightened or excited by it. He was also a little surprised that Sarah seemed to have accepted this place much better than him.
As he lay back on his bed, his feet slightly hanging off the end, he wasn’t at all sure what tomorrow would bring.
Chapter Forty Eight
Sarah awoke several times during the night and each time she listened intently but could hear nothing out of the ordinary. Her dreams were a nonsensical mixture of the children, Ben and her father and when she woke for the last time she was relieved that the light was beginning to stream through the curtains. Now she could hear noises from outside her door, so she quickly dressed, removed the chair from the door and went out into the corridor.
She followed the noises downstairs and detected the faint smell of cooking of some sort. She walked down the stairs and went into the kitchen.
She saw Ben hunched over a pan on the oven.
‘Hope you like sausage and beans from a can?’ said Ben as he turned around holding two plates and put them on the table.
‘It’s really well equipped this place. Well if you like tinned stuff that is,’ he said as they began to eat. ‘Don’t think they get many fresh vegetable here. Not sure the local supermarket delivers.’
After they had eaten most of the food Ben said ‘We can have a look around this place this morning if you like?’
Sarah nodded.
Before he opened the front door, he ha
lf expected that he had imagined what he had seen yesterday. He would open the door and there would just be forest as far as the eye could see, and that would be all.
But as he looked out on the scene before him as he opened the door it was exactly as he had remembered it. The bright sunshine rendered the scene even more surreal as it glanced off the roofs and reflected off the other house windows.
His initial thoughts from yesterday were confirmed. It did look like a village scene had been created in the middle of a seemingly impenetrable forest. Now he could see more clearly, there were four houses, all looking remarkably similar.
He turned to Sarah and said ‘Well, we didn’t imagine it then.’
Sarah didn’t reply and Ben could see that the far away expression in her face had returned.
Silently they set off away from the house.
As they walked across the green Ben noticed for the first time that the grass was cascading over his hiking boots. It clearly hadn't been cut for a while.
They both walked up to the next house in the row and Ben peered in through the window. As far as he could see, it was an exact copy of the house they were staying in.
As Ben went to the front door he could see that there did seem to be one difference; the frame of the door was broken.
'I think we had better be careful,' said Ben in a hushed voice. They stood to the side of the doorway and Ben pushed slowly at the door.
The door swung loudly open, which made Ben wince, and it collapsed inwards with a tremendous noise. If they had wanted to go unnoticed, then they had failed. Everything for a mile around would know they were here.
Ben peered cautiously around the door and into the room. The state of the door hadn't adequately prepared him for the state of the room.
The furniture was all upended and broken and there was smashed glass littering the floor, the sideboard was teetering precariously against the side of the sofa.
Ben leaned forward to talk to Sarah. 'I guess we had better go in and look.' He said it tentatively, he would have been quite happy for Sarah to say 'No, it's too dangerous.' But she didn't and he was committed now.