Escape Room (Underlined Paperbacks)

by Stoffels, Maren

And then he’d kiss me.

  “No,” Miles had said in reality. “I’m not gay.”

  Even after that, I was still hopeful. Maybe he was in the denial phase, like me in the beginning. Maybe I just needed to be patient.

  But now that I’ve told him and seen how he reacted, I know it’s not denial. He’s disgusted at the thought of me looking at him in that way.

  Over the past few months, I’ve done everything I could to forget Miles. I called in sick. I tried to imagine that he stank or had a disgusting personality that I would eventually discover.

  But it didn’t work. I want him to be with me the way he is with Alissa. He’s caring, attentive…and completely out of reach for me.

  “So why are you with Caitlin?” Alissa is looking at me like I’m a stranger.

  What was I supposed to do? Alissa often used to make it clear that she thought it was weird for me to ignore all that attention from girls. Caitlin was the only one I dared to try it with. She really is okay. Somehow her blue eyes reminded me of Miles’s.

  Alissa shakes her head. “You used her as a cover.”

  “So what?!” I yell at her. “What do you care?”

  I’d like to do the same as Mint—to give Alissa a slap. It sometimes seems like she has everything. She has no idea what it’s like not to have what she’s got.

  She’s my best friend, and at the same time I hate her. She took Miles away from me, even though I never had him.

  Does she really think I don’t feel guilty about Caitlin? But I needed her. I wasn’t ready to come out of the closet. I’m still not ready. Not even now. I don’t want the image that people have of me to change.

  I turn to go back to Lia’s room, but then, to my horror, I see Mint standing in the doorway.

  How long has she been there? Long enough to know I’m gay, but she’s looking at me very differently than Alissa and Miles. She has her head at a bit of an angle and a vague smile on her lips, as if she’s finally solved a tricky sudoku after weeks of puzzling.

  Mint knows what it’s like to be different from other people. She knows how it feels for Alissa to have everything when you have nothing. Mint lives in her shadow every day.

  “Come on,” I say to Mint. “Let’s go open up the third room.”

  Sky’s hand is shaking so much that he can’t get the key into the hole.

  “Give it here,” I say quietly. “I’ll try.”

  Sky’s in love with Miles. I can hardly believe it. I always thought he liked Alissa. What was I basing that on? That remark on the first day of school? Or because I assumed all the boys liked her?

  “Not all the boys,” Sky had said, but I didn’t understand then what he really meant.

  It’s Miles he’s in love with, just like Alissa. So he won’t believe my version of what happened in Lia’s room either.

  The door opens, and we see a masculine room. On the single bed there’s a checkered comforter, with a photo of a football team on the wall above. There’s a dresser with three drawers and a keyboard in the corner.

  There are photos on the dresser, which I study, one by one. A photo of a couple around Mom and Dad’s age draws my attention.

  “This must be the doctor.” I pick up the photo and point at another one. “And that blond girl must be Lia.”

  Sky doesn’t reply. When I look up, I see that he’s sat down on the bed, with his eyes closed.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  Sky slowly shakes his head. “It hurts. I’m worried that I’m losing too much blood.”

  I look at his wet bandage. It needs to be changed, but the new one will be soaked through within five minutes too.

  “I want to stitch you up, but I don’t know how.”

  Sky gives me a crooked grin. “Then don’t do it.”

  I sit down next to him. Our thighs touch. He must have felt so lonely all this time. Particularly this week, when Miles fell for Alissa.

  “You’re still just Sky to me. Whether you’re gay or not.”

  Sky looks up. “I’ve destroyed everything, Mint. Because of me, Caitlin—”

  “Cleo’s not interested in Caitlin,” I say to reassure him. “She’s interested in us.”

  Sky sniffs, and I can tell he’s crying. I want to comfort him. He needs to know that he’s not the only one with a secret.

  “I feel other people’s pain. I can tell when someone’s going to suffer pain, because I feel it in my own body. Before Alissa broke her wrist, my wrist hurt. Same thing with your piercings. And your fingers.”

  There’s silence for a moment. What am I going to do if Sky thinks I’m a drama queen just like Alissa?

  “Do you see things too?” Sky asks. “Ghosts and stuff?”

  I burst out laughing. I can’t help it. “No, thank goodness.”

  “Is that why you stay home with stomachaches so often?”

  I nod. “When the older kids had their final exams, I could hardly eat for a week. I felt their nerves, as if they were mine.”

  “And you can predict it,” Sky says. “So you feel it before the other person feels it?”

  I nod again. “Something’s going to happen to Miles’s stomach.”

  Sky looks at me, startled. “Is Cleo going to hurt him?”

  “Maybe.”

  “We have to warn him.” Sky goes to stand up, but I pull him back.

  “He’ll never believe me,” I say.

  “You don’t know that. We have to—”

  “No.” I’m shocked by the fierceness of my voice. “I can’t go to Miles.”

  Sky doesn’t ask any questions. Maybe he’s too weak; perhaps he knows how annoying it is when you’re pressured to say something you don’t really want to say.

  * * *

  —

  “How do you stand it?” Sky asks after a while.

  I’ve already searched the whole room twice. Sky stayed on the bed. His face is going whiter and whiter.

  “What, exactly?”

  “All the boys falling for Alissa?”

  Strangely enough, it doesn’t hurt when Sky says it, even though it’s the same as what Cleo said earlier this evening.

  “You get used to it,” I say. “To being a shadow.”

  “You’re not supposed to be a shadow,” Sky says. “You can’t let it happen.”

  “It happens automatically.” I think about the park last week. Miles ignored me. I thought that was fine. The high wall I stand behind keeps me safe. No one can touch me there.

  “That’s too bad,” Sky says. “You can do so much more than you let on.”

  What he says touches me. I don’t know how to respond, so I press a key on the keyboard, and to my surprise it’s connected.

  Lia’s voice comes through the intercom. It feels like we haven’t heard her for hours.

  “Will you play for me?”

  “Okay,” says a boy’s voice. Is this his room?

  Then there’s the sound of a piano playing, very delicately. Every note the boy plays makes me feel warmer. A strong memory flashes back to me.

  I’m sitting with my mom and dad in church on Christmas Eve. It’s the only day of the year when we go to church. I’m sitting between them. Mom puts some money in the collection box, and Dad puts his arm around me. His arms are long enough to reach around me to Mom.

  It’s one of those rare moments when the three of us are together, without work, stress, and hassle. Will I ever have another moment like that?

  The intercom falls silent.

  It seems like an innocent piece of music, but I know that there’s a reason for everything in this Escape Room. Cleo is going to keep on sending us puzzles, even though I’m sure she’ll never let us go.

  “It’s that keyboard.” I point at the black-and-white keys. “We have to play something on it.”

  “But what?” asks Sky.

  I think about the clue in Lia’s room. We thought the room was just a distraction, but there was more to it.

  “The music box,” I say. �
�Beethoven.”

  Sky looks up, like he’s remembering something. “Miles plays the keyboard.”

  How could Cleo see that Sky likes me and I didn’t, even when it was right under my nose?

  I glance sideways at Alissa. Since we’ve been alone, she hasn’t said a word. I think she’s on my side, but I don’t know for sure.

  I want to protect her in here. She has to understand that. She needs to know I’m here for her.

  “Can you help us?”

  When I look up, I see Mint standing in the doorway. It’s a moment before I realize she’s talking to me.

  I’m surprised she dares to speak to me after what happened in Lia’s room.

  “Can you play ‘Für Elise’ on the keyboard?” Mint asks nervously.

  I think about the keyboard in my own room. It was a present from my dad, but I never play it. I’m afraid it will bring up the memories I’m desperately trying to push away.

  “It’ll get us into the last room.”

  Alissa completely ignores Mint. She’s lost her two friends, but that won’t be enough for Cleo. It won’t be long before it’s Alissa’s turn….

  “I’m coming.”

  Miles is still just as handsome as he was a few minutes ago. How can I ever get him out of my mind when I could draw him with my eyes closed?

  I know he has a small birthmark on his right ear. That he likes things to be lined up straight. How many times did he tidy my worktop? Whenever I got back from the bathroom, my knife would be in a straight line with the chopping board, the tomatoes would be neatly sliced and waiting in a row, and the dish towel would be folded over the handle of the oven. Miles does everything perfectly. Miles is perfection.

  “You want me to play Beethoven?” Miles asks me. His tone is distant. He seems to be finding it hard to look at me.

  “Yes.” I point at the keyboard. “Can you do that?”

  Miles nods sourly and sits down at the keyboard. First he plays the wrong notes. I’m about to suggest fetching the music box, but then the right tune begins to flow from his fingers.

  If we ever get out of here, I’ll never be able to listen to that song again. It will always remind me of this scene: my hand in the bloody bandage and Miles not daring to look at me. Mint and Alissa not talking to each other, and that lock of Caitlin’s hair on the floor of the next room. Cleo has completely torn us apart.

  The key to the last room is in a drawer that slides out of the keyboard as soon as Miles has finished playing. He goes back to Alissa in the doctor’s office. It’s too painful for the four of us to be together.

  I no longer feel the adrenaline when we find something new. I just feel empty and numb.

  * * *

  —

  The last room turns out to be a living room. There’s a bookcase, a table with five chairs, and a saggy sofa, and there’s an open kitchen. There are candles on the table, with hardened wax spilling into their holders.

  Mint hurries to the windows, but they’re fake, of course, with a brick wall behind them.

  I try to imagine other people who have done this Escape Room. They gave their experience five stars. Would I have done the same if Cleo hadn’t been here? Maybe.

  I sit down on the sofa, feeling exhausted and dizzy.

  What does it feel like when you’re dying from blood loss? I think you lose consciousness first, and then you drift away until your heart stops beating.

  Does it hurt?

  “Can I light the candles?”

  “Later. Okay?”

  Those voices again. I can’t take it anymore. I try to tune them out, but then the intercom falls silent.

  I look at Mint, who is picking up each of the candles in turn and looking underneath them.

  What are we actually hoping to find?

  Cleo won’t let us go. She’s going to let me bleed to death in here.

  I think about the key Mint and I found in Lia’s room. What little hope we had has disappeared.

  And then I remember the conversation I didn’t get to finish with Mint just before we lifted up the floorboard.

  “You never finished telling me about your fight with Alissa and Miles….”

  Mint is searching the rest of the living room. She ignores my comment.

  “Mint?”

  Mint looks at me. “Just leave it.”

  “Why?”

  “You won’t believe me anyway. Certainly not now.”

  “Because I’m in love with him, you mean?”

  Will I ever get used to saying it out loud?

  “Exactly.” Mint sighs. “Miles threatened me. He put his hand on my throat and pressed with his thumb. Here.” Mint points at a place on her throat. “He told me not to go shooting my mouth off to Alissa about what I saw.”

  It’s all too much for me.

  “He tried to strangle you?”

  “He threatened me,” says Mint. “He’s smart enough not to leave any marks.”

  Is this about the same Miles I know? Mint’s right. I don’t believe her.

  Miles is calmness itself. He never gets mad, even at the pizzeria when something goes wrong with an order. On a busy day, when everyone else is stressed out, he keeps his cool. I’ve never heard him curse or raise his voice.

  “Yesterday I saw him flip out at someone who was walking past.”

  I try to picture it, but I can’t do it.

  “That someone was Cleo.”

  I feel a shiver run down my back, but oddly it’s dripping with sweat at the same time. My hand is throbbing with pain.

  “I don’t want to hurt you.” Mint comes to sit next to me. I look at her short hair. She let Alissa cut it to save my so-called girlfriend. Mint always does everything for everyone else. Why would she lie about this? I think she’s terrified of Miles.

  Then I remember the way he looked at me when I said I liked him. Miles’s eyes were so cold that I thought I’d never feel warm again. I could imagine that Miles getting mad. That Miles could definitely have threatened Mint. And apparently he’s met Cleo before.

  “We need to get Alissa away from him.”

  Mint looks at me in surprise. “But she doesn’t believe me. There’s no point.”

  “I know.” I feel dizzy, but I blink it away. This isn’t the moment to die. I have to keep fighting. “But we’ll do it anyway.”

  I can’t take this anymore.

  Sky lied about Caitlin.

  Mint’s lying about Miles.

  They’re both liars.

  When I stand up, I see Miles looking, but he doesn’t ask where I’m going. Which is just as well, as I don’t think I’d dare tell him.

  I close the door of Lia’s room behind me. My bladder’s sore. I’ve been needing to pee ever since we got here.

  The round rug seems to be grinning at me. I can’t just squat down here, can I?

  The thought of Cleo watching me makes me desperately nervous.

  I can’t do it. It means losing my last bit of dignity.

  In the far corner, I slip down my panties, hoping it’s out of Cleo’s sight.

  It takes a moment, but then my pee splashes down onto the wooden floor.

  * * *

  —

  “What’s up?” Miles asks when I come back.

  I don’t want to talk. I want to feel like I did last night when we were sitting on his bed.

  I want to feel like myself again, just for a moment.

  “Kiss me.” I look at him and pull him into the corner of the room. “Please.”

  It has everything, but it’s never enough.

  Miles and Alissa are kissing in the doctor’s office. Sky’s face darkens, and I quickly take hold of his good hand to let him know he doesn’t have to do this alone.

  “Let her go.” Sky is the first to speak. “Now.”

  Miles and Alissa look up at the same moment, surprise on their faces.

  “Sorry?” says Miles. “What’s it got to do with you?”

  “You threatened Mint.”
<
br />   Sky is the same old bulldozer as ever. And it works, because Miles is blinking nervously.

  “That’s not true.”

  “Mint told me everything.” Sky looks at Alissa. “Why don’t you believe her?”

  “She’s lying.” Alissa looks at me. “You’re both lying.”

  There’s no point. Alissa doesn’t want to believe us. We’ve been friends for years, but apparently that’s nothing compared to this boy she’s known for just a week.

  It’s because of Miles. He’s so good at playing this game. If I were Alissa, I’d believe him too. There’s something charismatic about Miles.

  Bang! Another plastic ball falls into the room.

  I bet Cleo’s wanting to throw some more oil onto the fire. I’m too tired to ask what it says. Alissa is the only one who bothers to read the note.

  Her eyes dart over the lines, and then she looks at me. She has a strange expression on her face that I’ve never seen before. Then she turns to Miles and takes his hand. She places the plastic ball and the note on the desk and walks past us. I want to stop her. I want to say that she’s my best friend, even after everything that’s happened tonight. And that I’m sorry I slapped her, but I only did it because I had no choice. And I’m sometimes jealous of her, it’s true, but I’d never spread lies about Miles.

  But I can’t anymore. I feel defeated.

  I hear Alissa closing the door of the boy’s room behind her and Miles. Now it’s two against two. If we ever get out of this Escape Room, it won’t be as friends.

  I can feel tears stinging my eyes again. I don’t care now if Cleo sees me crying. Nothing matters anymore.

  “Mint…” Sky’s voice comes from a long way off.

  I wipe my eyes on my sleeve, but they fill right up with tears again.

  “Look at Cleo’s message.” Sky holds the strip of paper in front of my face.

  You guys really have no clue. I’m not the only one spying on you. It’s nice to have an accomplice, you see. As I already wrote, Miles is with me.