by Scott Smith
She hated the vine, too, of course, if it was possible to hate a plant. She hated its vivid green, its tiny red flowers, the sting of its sap against her skin. She hated it for being able to move, for its hunger, and its malevolence.
Her feet were still caked with mud from the long walk across that field the previous afternoon, and the mud continued to give off its faint scent of shit. Like Pablo, Stacy thought, her mind jumping up the hill, to what was happening there, the knife, the heated stone. She shuddered, shut her eyes.
Hate and more hate-Stacy was drowning in it, dropping downward, with no bottom in sight. She hated Pablo for having fallen into the shaft, hated him for his broken back, his fast-approaching death. She hated Eric for his wounded leg, for the vine moving wormlike beneath his skin, for his panic in the face of this. She hated Jeff for his competence, his coldness, for turning so easily to that knife and heated stone. She hated Amy for not stopping him, hated Mathias for his silences, his blank looks, hated herself most of all.
She opened her eyes, glanced about. A handful of minutes had passed, but nothing had changed.
Yes, she hated herself.
She hated herself for not knowing what time it was, or how much longer she'd have to sit here.
She hated herself for having stopped believing that Pablo was going to live.
She hated herself for knowing that the Greeks weren't going to come, not today, not ever.
She tilted back her umbrella, risked a quick look at the sky. Jeff was hoping for rain, she knew, depending on it. He was working to save them; he had plans and schemes and plots, but they all had the same flaw, the same weakness lurking within them-they all involved a degree of hope. And rain didn't come from hope; rain came from clouds, white or gray or the deepest of black-it didn't matter-they had to be there. But the sky above her was a blinding blue, stubbornly so, without a single cloud in sight.
It wasn't going to rain.
And this was just another thing for Stacy to hate herself for knowing.
They decided to drop back into the hole.
It was Jeff's idea, but Amy didn't argue. The Greeks weren't coming today. Everyone was admitting this now-to themselves at least, if not to the others-and thus the cell phone, the perhaps mythical cell phone calling to them from the bottom of the shaft, was the only thing left to pin their hopes on. So when Jeff proposed that they try one final time to find it, Amy startled him by agreeing.
They couldn't leave Pablo alone, of course. At first, they were going to have Amy sit with him while Eric and Mathias worked the windlass, lowering Jeff into the shaft. But Jeff wanted her to go, too. He was planning on making some sort of torch out of the archaeologists' clothes, soaking them in tequila, and he wasn't certain how long the light would last from this. Two sets of eyes down there would be more efficient than one, he said, allowing the search to be more thorough, more methodical.
Amy didn't want to go down into the hole again. But Jeff wasn't asking what she wanted; he was telling her whathe wanted, describing it as something that had already been decided, a problem they needed to solve.
"We could carry it to the hole," Mathias said, meaning the backboard, meaning Pablo, and they all thought about this for a moment. Then Jeff nodded.
So that was what they did. Jeff and Mathias lifted the backboard out from under the little lean-to, carried it across the hilltop to the mouth of the shaft-carefully, working hard not to jostle Pablo. There were some terrible smells coming off the Greek's body: the by-now-familiar stench of his shit and urine, the burned-meat stink of his stubs, and that sweeter scent, lingering underneath everything else, that first ominous hint of rot. No one said anything about it; no one said anything about Pablo at all, in fact. He was still unconscious, and appeared worse than ever. It wasn't just his legs Amy had to avoid looking at; it was also his face. When she'd first applied to medical school, she'd gone on some campus tours, and she'd seen the cadavers the students dissected: gray-skinned, sunken-eyed, slack-mouthed. That was what Pablo's face was beginning to look like, too.
They set him down beside the shaft. The chirping had stopped, but now, as soon as they arrived, it started up again, and they all stood there, staring into the darkness, heads cocked, listening.
It rang nine times. Then it stopped.
Mathias checked the rope. He unspooled it from the windlass, the whole thing, laying it out in a long zigzag across the little clearing, searching its hemp for weakness.
Amy stood beside the hole, peering into it, trying to gather her courage, remembering her time down there with Eric, just the two of them, the things they'd spoken of to keep their fear at bay, the lies they'd told each other. She didn't want to return again, would've said no if only she could've thought of a way to do so. But now that they'd carried Pablo all the way across the hilltop, she couldn't see how she had a choice.
Eric crouched, began to probe at the wound on his leg, muttering to himself. "We'll cut it off," he said, and Amy turned to stare at him, startled, not certain if she'd heard correctly. Then he was up and pacing once more. The vine had eaten holes in his shirt, almost shredding it. He was covered in his own blood, spattered and dripped and smeared with it. They all looked bad, but he looked the worst.
Jeff was making his torch. He used a tent pole, wrapping duct tape around its bottom for a grip so the aluminum wouldn't grow too hot for him to hold. He knotted some of the archaeologists' clothes around the top-a pair of denim shorts, a cotton T-shirt-tying them tight. Amy couldn't see how it was going to work, but she didn't say anything, was too worn-out to argue about it. If they had to attempt this, she wanted just to do it and get it done.
Mathias stood up, wiping his hands on his pants. The rope was fine. They all watched as he carefully wound it back around the windlass. When he was done, Jeff slid the sling over his head, tucking it under his arms. He was holding the box of matches, the already-opened bottle of tequila, his flimsy-looking torch. Mathias and Eric stepped to the windlass, leaning against the hand crank with all their weight. And then, without the slightest hint of hesitation, Jeff stepped into the open air above the shaft. He didn't say anything in parting to Amy; they hadn't talked about a plan. She was supposed to follow him into the hole-that was all she knew. The rest, they'd have to make up once they got down there.
There was that familiar creaking of the windlass. Mathias and Eric strained against its pull, letting the rope out, turn by turn, sweating with the labor of it. Amy leaned over the shaft, watched Jeff drop into the darkness; he seemed to grow smaller as he descended. She could see him for longer than she would've anticipated, as if he were somehow drawing the sunlight with him into the depths. He grew shadowy, ghostlike, but she could still discern him long after it seemed he should've vanished altogether. He didn't return her gaze, didn't lift his face to her, not once, kept his eyes focused downward, toward the bottom of the hole.
"Almost there," Mathias said. It wasn't clear whom he was talking to, perhaps himself; that was how quiet his voice was.
Amy turned, glanced at him, at the windlass. The rope was nearly played out, just a few more rotations to go. When she looked back into the shaft, Jeff was gone. The rope went down and down and down into the darkness, swaying slightly as it uncoiled, and she could no longer see its end. She had to resist the urge to call out to Jeff, the sense that he'd vanished not merely from sight but altogether.
The windlass finally stopped its creaking. Eric and Mathias joined Amy beside the hole, all three of them staring into it. Amy could hear the other two working to catch their breath. "All right?" Mathias called.
"Pull it up," Jeff yelled back. His voice seemed far away, full of echoes, not quite his own.
Mathias rewound the windlass by himself, and it went quickly, weightless, the creaking sounding different now, higher-pitched, with an odd hint of laughter in it, which was a creepy thing to hear. It made Amy shiver, hug herself. Say no, she was thinking. You can say it. Just say it. But then Eric was handing her the sling,
helping her into it, and she still hadn't spoken. It's not that bad, she told herself. You've already done it once. Why shouldn't you do it again? And those were the words she kept in her head as she stepped out into the open air, swaying there for a moment, before she began her slow descent into the hole.
It was different in daylight. Better in some ways, worse in others. She could see more, of course, as she moved downward-could see the shaft, with the rocks and timbers embedded in its walls, the vine growing here and there in long, looping strands, like decorations for a party. But the light also heightened the feeling of transit, of crossing a border as she dropped, moving from one world into another. It was an oppressive sensation. Day into night, sight into blindness, life into death: These were the connotations. Looking up wasn't the right idea, either-it only made things worse-because, even at this relatively shallow depth, the daylight already seemed impossibly far away. And, just as Jeff had appeared to grow smaller as he descended, now the hole looked to be shrinking, as if threatening to close altogether, like a mouth, swallowing her into the earth. She gripped the sling, concentrated on slowing her breathing, struggling to calm herself. The sling was damp-from Jeff's body, Amy assumed, his sweat. Or maybe it was her own. She was beginning to sway back and forth, almost touching the walls of the shaft, and she tried to stop herself, but that only seemed to make it worse, a wobbly, seasick feeling stirring in her gut. She still had the taste of vomit in her mouth, and this didn't help things, made it seem all the more possible, even with her stomach empty, that she might throw up here, puke spewing from her, splattering down on Jeff, waiting in the darkness below.
She shut her eyes.
Somehow, the feeling passed.
The air was growing cooler and cooler, cold even. Amy had forgotten about this, would've worn something warmer had she remembered, plundering a sweater from one of the archaeologists' backpacks. She began to shiver, even as she continued to sweat. Nerves, she knew: fear.
By the time she opened her eyes again, Jeff had come into view. Murkily: He was there, and not there. It was like seeing him underwater, or through smoke. He had his head tilted back. Amy couldn't make out his face, but there was something about his posture that made her certain he was smiling up at her. Despite herself-despite her fear, despite her sweating and shivering and general sense of discomfort-she smiled back.
Her feet touched the floor of the shaft. The sling went slack; the creaking stopped. And it was odd, because the sudden silence gave her a panicky sensation, a tightness in her chest. "Well," she said, just for the sound of the words, to break that eerie quiet. "Here we are."
Jeff was helping her out of the sling. "It's incredible," he said. "Isn't it? How far down do you think we are?"
Amy was too startled by the obvious excitement in his voice, the pleasure, to answer him. He was enjoying this, she realized. Even with everything that had happened in the past twenty-four hours, somehow he was managing to find pleasure in this. He was like a little boy, with a little boy's passions: the illicit joys of things underground-caves and hideouts and secret tunnels.
"Farther than I've ever been," he said. "No doubt about that. You think it could be a hundred feet?"
"Jeff," she said. It was strange: they were in darkness, but there was light, too. Or some hint of it, some residue dropping toward them from above. As her eyes kept adjusting, she could see more and more, the walls and floor of the shaft, and Jeff, too-his face. She could see him peering at her, his puzzled expression.
"What?" he asked.
"Let's just find the phone, okay?"
He nodded. "Right. The phone."
Amy watched him crouch, begin to prepare his torch. He uncapped the tequila, started to sprinkle the liquor over the knot of clothing, slowly, letting it soak in. He took his time, pouring a small trickle, then pausing, then pouring some more. Amy could smell the tequila; she was so emptied out-hungry, thirsty, tired-that the scent alone made her feel slightly drunk. She could see a sock and a shoe lying on the floor of the shaft, a few feet to Jeff's right, and it took a long moment to realize that they were Pablo's. They were the ones Eric had removed yesterday so that he could scrape the bottom of Pablo's foot to see if his spine was broken. They'd forgotten them in the flurry of their departure last night, and now they were already covered with a thin growth of vine. Amy almost bent to retrieve them, thinking Pablo would want them, but then she caught herself, feeling stupid. And wretched, too, because-morbidly-she'd started to smile. No need for socks and shoes anymore, of course, not for Pablo, not ever again.
"There was a shovel there last night," she said, surprising herself with the words. She hadn't thought them out first, hadn't even been conscious of noticing the shovel's absence until she'd heard herself remark upon it. She pointed toward the far wall of the shaft, where the shovel had been leaning. It wasn't there anymore.
Jeff turned, followed her gesture. "Are you sure?" he asked.
She nodded. "It was the kind you can fold up."
Jeff stared for another moment, then returned to his torch, dribbling more tequila across it. "Maybe they took it," he said.
"They?"
"The vines."
"Why would they do that?"
"Mathias and I were trying to dig a hole earlier, using a rock and a tent stake-for a latrine, and to distill our urine. Maybe they don't want us to be able to do that."
Amy was silent. There was so much to contest in this that she felt something like panic in the face of it, a buzzing sensation rising in her head. She didn't know where to begin. "You're saying they can see? They could see you digging?"
Jeff shrugged. "They have to have some way of sensing things. How else would they be able to reach out and take Pablo's feet like that?"
Pheromones, Amy was thinking. Reflexes. She didn't want the vine to be able to see, was horrified by the prospect of this, wanted its actions to be automatic, preconscious. "And it can communicate?" she said.
Jeff stopped with the bottle, capped it; the clothes were thoroughly saturated now. "What do you mean?"
"They saw you digging up there, and then they told the ones down here to hide the shovel." She wanted to laugh, the idea seemed so absurd. But something was keeping her from laughing, that buzzing in her head.
"I guess," Jeff said.
"And they think? "
"Definitely."
"But-"
"They dragged down my sign. How could they have known to do that without-"
"They're plants, Jeff. Plants don't see. They don't communicate. They don't think. They-"
"Was there a shovel there last night?" He gestured toward the shaft's far wall.
"I think so. I-"
"Then where is it now?"
Amy was silent. She couldn't answer this.
"If something moved it," Jeff said, "don't you think it makes sense to assume it was the vine?"
Before she could respond, the chirping resumed. It was coming from her left, down the open shaft. Jeff fumbled quickly with the box of matches, plucked one out, struck it into flame, held it to the knot of clothing. The alcohol seemed to grab at the match, sucking its light into itself with a fluttering sound, a cloud of pale blue fire materializing around the torch. Jeff lifted it up, held it before them; it gave off a weak, tenuous glow, which seemed constantly on the verge of going out. Amy could tell it wouldn't last long.
"Quick," he said, waving her toward the open shaft.
The chirping continued-it was up to three rings now-and the two of them rushed forward, hurrying to find it before it fell silent again. Five rapid strides and they were into the shaft, a steady stream of cold air pushing against them, making the torch in Jeff's hand shudder weakly. Amy felt a moment's terror, leaving that small square of open sky behind, the ceiling dropping low enough for Jeff to have to crouch as he moved forward. The darkness seemed to press in on them, to constrict somehow with each step they took, as if the walls and ceiling of the shaft were shifting inward. The vine, oddly, in such a l
ightless place, appeared to be growing in great profusion here, covering every available surface. They were wading through it, knee-deep, and it was hanging toward them from above, too, brushing against Amy's face; if she hadn't been so desperate to find the phone, she would've immediately turned and fled.
There came a fourth chirp, still in front of them, drawing them more deeply into the shaft. Amy could sense a wall somewhere ahead-even in the darkness, even without being able to glimpse it yet-somehow she knew that the shaft came to an end in another thirty feet or so. The chirping had an echo to it, but it still seemed clear to her that the phone was by this far wall, lying on the floor, buried beneath the vines. They'd need to get on their hands and knees to search for it. She was nearly running now, her eagerness to find the phone before it stopped ringing combining with her terror of this place, both of them working together to push her onward.
Jeff was moving more cautiously, hanging back. She was leaving him and his torch behind her, the vine brushing against her body, but softly, caressingly, seeming almost to part to allow her passage.
"Wait," Jeff said, and then he stopped altogether, holding the flickering torch out before him, trying to see more clearly.
Amy ignored him; all she wanted was to get there, to find it, to leave. She could see the wall now, or something like it: a shadow materializing in front of her, a blockage.
"Amy," Jeff said, louder now, his voice echoing back at her from the approaching wall. She hesitated, slowing, half-turning, and it came to her suddenly that the vine was moving, that this was the sense of constriction she was feeling; it wasn't simply the darkness deepening, the shaft narrowing. No, it was the flowers. Hanging from the ceiling, the walls, rising toward her from the floor, the flowers on the vine were moving, opening and closing like so many tiny mouths. Realizing this, she nearly stopped altogether. But then the phone chirped a fifth time, drawing her on; she knew there wouldn't be many more rings. And it was close now, too-right against the wall, she guessed. All she had to do was drop onto her-
