by Bowman, Dave
“I’m in the last room!” Charlotte called.
Annie arrived at the very last room, where the hallway dead-ended.
“I’m here, Charlotte!” Annie called. “I’m going to get you out of there. Just hold on!”
Now to find the right key.
Annie looked at the large set of keys in her palm, then at the door before her. This last door was different from all the rest. Larger and more ornate, with scrollwork carved into the wood.
It’s got to be this one.
She selected the largest key of all, the one that looked to be antique. Inserting it into the keyhole, she smiled as it turned and opened the door.
“Oh, thank God!” Charlotte said.
Annie stepped inside the room, lighting it up with the candle. She gasped.
In the corner, Charlotte was strapped to a chair, with the same kind of cordage Annie had seen in her own room.
“Poor Charlotte!” Annie exclaimed, rushing over to her side.
She fumbled with the knots for a moment, struggling to untie them. She looked around for a knife or something to cut them with, but finding nothing, she returned to untie them. Charlotte urged her to hurry.
“I thought I was going to die in here!” Charlotte said. “But where – where’s Dan?”
“I locked him up in the room downstairs,” Annie said as she finally made some headway with one of the knots.
“Is he dead?” Charlotte asked.
“No,” Annie said. “But he’s unconscious. He won’t bother us for now.”
She finally loosened all the knots, and Charlotte stood up. Wiping the tears away from her eyes, Charlotte gave Annie an emotional hug.
“Thank you so much,” Charlotte gushed. “I’m so sorry for ever doubting you. We never should have gotten into Dan’s car.”
“It’s okay. Just try to remember this next time, all right?” Annie asked, looking at her friend with a smile.
Charlotte nodded. “I will. You’re the boss from now on.”
Annie looked around the room. A large bed with luxurious linens stood in the center. Mahogany furniture, exotic tapestries, and fine art filled the room.
“Gross,” Annie said, disgusted. “I guess this is Dan’s room?”
Charlotte shook her head. “I don’t think so. He went downstairs somewhere to sleep. I don’t know… I get the feeling this is his parents’ room.”
She walked over to an armoire and picked up a framed photograph.
“Look,” she said, handing it to Annie.
Annie peered at the photograph. It looked to be taken in the 1970s. A young couple sat on a picnic blanket in the middle of a field dotted with wildflowers. The man and woman smiled down at their two sons, who looked to be about ten years old.
“I guess it’s Dan’s family, huh?” Annie mused. “What happened to him? They look like the perfect, happy family.”
Charlotte shrugged her shoulders. “Picture-perfect on the outside, rotten on the inside.”
Annie squinted at the photo, noticing something she hadn’t seen before.
Written in pencil and faded from age, someone had scrawled across the sky of the photograph:
For all of these things and more, I will deliver justice.
Annie shivered from the chill passing through her.
Charlotte, who had read over her shoulder, groaned. “Yikes! That is really creepy. What does that mean, exactly?”
Annie returned the photograph to the armoire. “I’m not sure, but I’m guessing Dan wrote it. I think he had a really strange relationship with his family.”
“Yeah, I’d say so,” Charlotte said, sighing. “So, what do we do now?”
“We can’t leave,” Annie said. “I know I wanted to leave earlier, but that’s because there was a crazy lunatic who wanted to kill us.”
“Not funny,” Charlotte interjected.
“Anyway, I think we should stay here another day. Now that Dan won’t hurt us, I don’t want to risk radiation poisoning.”
Charlotte raised her eyebrows. “Are you sure it’s safe? What if he wakes up? What if there’s some secret passageway out of that room that we don’t know about? This house is so freaky, it wouldn’t surprise me.”
Annie knew Charlotte was right. Dan could wake up at any moment. And who knew what other tricks he had up his sleeve.
Annie opened the top drawer of the armoire. Inside was ladies’ underwear. She groaned and began to look through the items.
“Ew. Do you think that belonged to Dan’s mother?” Charlotte asked, disgusted.
Finished with the first drawer, Annie moved on to the next one.
“Honestly, I’d rather not think about that,” Annie said distractedly. “I’m looking for a gun. Here, you take over the armoire. I’m going to check the bedside tables.”
Charlotte made a noise of disapproval, but she took over the search in the dresser drawers. Annie hurried over to the nightstands. But the drawers were empty.
Annie looked up, then ran toward the door.
“Come on, let’s go downstairs!” Annie said over her shoulder. “I bet you Dan’s room is the one he was sleeping in all along. The one that connected to the library.”
Annie grabbed the candle, and the two of them rushed through the hallway and down the stairs. They crossed the living room and rounded the corner into the passageway where they had spent the previous night.
After trying several keys, Annie finally found the correct one. She unlocked the door and flung it open.
The room looked to be a boy’s bedroom from the 1970s.
Charlotte groaned again. “Don’t tell me. Dan hasn’t changed a thing in his bedroom for fifty years.”
Annie headed straight to the bedside table. She pulled the drawer open, holding the candle beside it to see.
Inside was a .22.
Success.
Annie lifted the pistol. She opened the barrel. It was loaded.
“Are you ready?” Annie asked. “I just need you to stand in the hall with – “
Annie looked around the room. Her eyes fell on a baseball bat in the corner. She grabbed it and handed it to Charlotte.
“With this. If anything goes wrong, hit him with this.”
Charlotte swallowed.
“Can you really do this, Annie?”
Annie stopped for a moment. She hadn’t really had a chance to ask herself that question yet.
Of course, she could technically do it. Her father had taught her to shoot as a child. And she always got some target practice in with Jack at the ranch.
But could she morally do it?
Could she pull the trigger? Could she take someone’s life?
As she pondered those questions, she felt her energy falling. Maybe this was the wrong thing to do.
Did Dan really pose a risk to them? She had knocked him unconscious with several blows to the head. Then she had tied him up. How could he escape?
But maybe she shouldn’t take that chance. Even though it was a slim possibility he could escape, the possibility was still there.
Why should she risk their lives?
And what would they do with him when they left? He would still be stuck in that room, left behind to die a miserable death of dehydration. Wouldn’t the moral thing be to end his life quickly, with less suffering?
How could she leave him to rot like that? To die a slow, painful death?
With dark shadows cast across her face, Charlotte stared at her.
“Annie? Are you all right?”
Annie nodded and turned away. “I just need a moment.”
The family picture upstairs flashed in her mind. Dan had been a child once. He had been innocent. How could she take his life?
How could she live with herself after killing him?
She would have to carry the weight of it for the rest of her life.
Annie took a deep breath.
Dan had wanted to hurt her. He had wanted to hurt Charlotte. He was probably going to murder them.
If he escaped, he would be released on the world. How many others would he hurt if he somehow walked free?
Annie turned around to face her friend. The candlelight danced across Charlotte’s cheeks.
Annie knew what she had to do.
“Let’s go.”
Annie inhaled as she walked to the door. She exhaled as she turned the doorknob.
Just keep breathing. You can do this.
With Charlotte behind her, Annie entered the hallway. The flame flickered as she walked, lighting her path.
Her stomach was in knots. There were a million questions in her mind. But Annie couldn’t turn back now.
She had to keep them safe.
They were going to survive this, no matter what.
She stopped at the door of the room where she’d left Dan. With her heart racing, she unlocked it and swung it open.
There was silence inside the room.
Maybe he was still unconscious. Annie hoped he was – it would make this easier.
She could hear Charlotte, who waited nearby in the hallway, breathing softly.
Annie lifted the candle to see inside the room.
She flinched as the light fell on Dan.
He was awake.
His hands were still tightly bound with his arms outstretched, but he had managed to pull himself up to his knees. It looked like he had been trying to free his hands from the cordage.
He turned his head to look up at Annie. His eyes met hers. Slowly, his mouth opened into a wide grin.
“Annie, darling,” he cooed through his smile. “There’s been some kind of misunderstanding.”
Annie pushed a slow breath through her open lips. She stood in a wide stance, her feet set firmly on the floor.
His grin told her everything. He was sick. He would hurt them if she didn’t end it right now.
She had to do it.
“I understand perfectly,” she said.
Annie raised the pistol, aiming at her target.
She pulled the trigger.
A shot blast through the room. It struck Dan square in the chest.
For a split second, his eyes grew round as he stared at the gun. Then his face fell as he slumped down, falling to the side. Dark blood flowed from the gaping wound.
She pulled the trigger twice more.
He fell to the floor with a thud. His body was limp.
Annie watched the lifeless form for a moment.
He was gone.
A lump formed in her throat. She had killed him.
She looked at the gun in her hands, which were now shaking.
Is this really happening? Annie found herself wondering.
She had a strange sensation as she stood there. Everything felt unreal.
Trembling, she flicked the gun’s safety back on. Her movements felt odd, like she was moving through thick fog.
Slowly, she left the room and pulled the door closed. With the key, she locked the door, just in case.
She looked up at Charlotte.
“It’s done.”
Their gaze met, and they were quiet for a moment.
Finally, Charlotte wrapped her arms around Annie, pulling her in for a hug.
“Thank you for taking care of me,” Charlotte said. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without you.”
Annie smiled a little as she met Charlotte’s eyes again, briefly, before looking away.
Taking a few breaths, Annie glanced at the gun she still held in her hand. She was shaken, but relieved.
She shivered a little, pushing the image of Dan falling to the floor out of her mind.
For now, they needed to get to a safe place. She looked up and squared her shoulders.
“Come on, let’s get back to the library,” Annie said, leading the way through the dark hallway. “I don’t know about you, but I could use some sleep. Then tomorrow, we can go home.”
“And we won’t be walking anymore!” Charlotte added.
“That’s right,” Annie remembered with relief. “I bet one of these keys will drive that nice car out there.”
Annie and Charlotte got to the end of the hallway and stopped in front of the library.
Annie could see the living room from where she stood. The sun was rising, and she glimpsed the large picture window in the next room.
Knowing it wasn’t safe to be near a window, she hurried to open the library door. As she fumbled for the key, she craned her neck to get a look at the outside world beyond the large pane of glass.
Outside, she could see the lake stretching out to the horizon. The light of early dawn cast the water in a deep blue-gray shade. It was serene and beautiful, a welcome relief from the gore she had witnessed down the hall.
There are those lake views Dan promised us.
Annie turned the key in the door, pushed it open, and she and Charlotte stepped inside the refuge of the library once more.
They were finally safe.
Exhausted, they settled onto their couches to get some rest. Annie blew the candle out, and she sighed as darkness fell over the room. Charlotte fell asleep quickly.
As she listened to Charlotte snore lightly for several minutes, Annie stared into the dark space of the library. She was still wide awake.
She was glad to have seen a glimpse of the lake. It gave her some kind of comfort to know the lake – the outside world – was still there.
The world would carry on. Their lives would carry on. One way or another.
Annie knew she would be forever haunted by what she had done that night. The terrible intensity, the sound, the sight of Dan dying. . .
It would stay with her the rest of her life.
Still, though, she knew that she’d had no choice. And that gave her a certain peace.
But she would never feel at ease until her husband returned. He was out there somewhere, over a thousand miles away. She could only hope he was safe.
She had to see Jack again. Then, everything would really be okay. Only then would she truly be able to rest, knowing that her husband was safe.
Please, if you’re out there, come home. Find some way to get here.
Annie closed her eyes.
Soon, they could leave this place. Soon, she could go home. Maybe she would even start the journey to Jack’s ranch, and hope to meet him there.
Just one more day.
25
A sliver of light filtered through the tiny crack at the bottom of the door.
Jack woke with a start. The pain from his injuries was the first thing he was aware of.
He looked around. Brent and Naomi were asleep nearby. Everyone was safe.
They had made it through the night.
He must have gotten only a couple hours of sleep. He had stayed awake through much of the night, on high alert. He’d listened intently for any noise. Having two unwanted visitors in a row had made him jumpy.
But now it was early morning. And no one else had bothered them.
He was relieved.
Even the thin beam of light filtering in under the bedroom door was enough to lift his spirits a little.
They were no longer in total darkness.
It was morning.
He wished he could say it was a new beginning, but the events of the previous night hadn’t left him feeling exactly optimistic.
They had been trying to find a peaceful refuge. But violence seemed to follow them everywhere.
Still, though, they had persevered. They hadn’t been defeated.
They were still alive.
Jack was a little worse for wear, though. He had endured some heavy blows from Frank. His face seared with pain, and his back burned each time he moved.
Last night, he had used just a bit of their water supply to clean his wounds. He’d used some of the bandages and antibiotic cream they had taken from the convenience store as well.
Beside him, Brent stirred. He lifted his head and looked around. Jack got a glimpse of his eye – swollen and purple from F
rank’s punch.
Naomi, woken from the movement, opened her eyes as well.
Jack looked at each of them in turn.
“It’s okay,” he told them. “You can go back to sleep.”
Brent and Naomi settled back into their places on the floor and soon were dozing again. Jack figured he would catch some more rest later in the day while the other two were awake.
But for now, he didn’t mind being awake. Besides, they would need to get used to sleeping in shifts. It would be safer for someone to be on watch at all times.
There would be so much to do. Once they could venture outside again, he wanted to teach the other two how to use a gun. After all, they had three pistols now. They had to protect themselves.
Another priority would be transportation. They would look high and low for an older model vehicle that might run.
Jack knew that everyone in Los Angeles County would be looking for a vehicle like that, as well. But it wouldn’t hurt to try.
There would be food and water to find, and shelter to secure.
And there would be danger lurking around every corner.
Once they ventured outside, nothing would be for sure. They’d have to work to get everything they would need. They’d have to be vigilant and smart.
Outside the abandoned house Jack now found himself in, he imagined the radioactive contamination falling to the ground. Anyone out there at that moment would be endangering their lives.
And 1,400 miles away, the same nuclear fallout might have been falling to the ground at that very moment.
Annie had to be indoors, safe. She had to.
He closed his eyes and made a silent promise to his wife.
I’ll find you. No matter what, I’ll make it home to you.
Jack opened his eyes and looked around again.
The dreary state of the room he was in became more obvious as the beam of light grew stronger. He could see all of it – the dirt and grime, the trash and graffiti.
And he could see everything he had to do. It was all laid out clearly.
Despite all the violence, all the struggle they had been through just to make it to that filthy little room, Jack didn’t regret what he’d done. Nothing had been easy. But then, not much would be in this new world.
