by J. Thorn
“Stay calm,” Neil said.
“What are we gonna do?” Isaac asked.
The day care had a thick, windowless door leading into the main room, which had been designed as a safety precaution. With all the recent school shootings in the news, even day care owners had to satisfy worried parents.
“We’ve got to try and leave,” Monica said.
“I agree,” Neil said.
Marie still had her canasta cards in her hand. “You think I’m going to be able to outrun them? And I’m one of the more active seniors in this place.”
Neil scanned the room. The folks on the couch were awake, but not moving. Marie was right. There was no way they’d be able to escape the men outside—not with this group.
The men outside shouted and hollered. Two spoke directly to the people inside the day care center.
“Let us in.”
“It’ll make it easier on all of us. We know you ain’t got no muscle or weapons in there.”
The children began to cry. A few of the adults wiped at their tears. Neil looked at them and then toward the men on the other side of the wall. He mumbled something under his breath before addressing the group.
“Look, we’re going to gather everyone up and hide in the administrative office in the back, all right? The room has a thick door and no windows. Get them going, Isaac.”
Neil hurried back to the office. His hands shook as he fumbled with the keys. Neil spotted the one for the administrative office and pushed it into the lock to open the door. He looked around. Even with the desk, it would be large enough to hold everyone inside.
He used a chair to prop the door open and ran back into the main room. An older kid pushed a group of toddlers toward Neil. He ushered them to the administrative office and through the door.
“We’re coming in.”
The glass panels on the front door shattered. Several in the group froze or cried out.
“Keep going,” Neil said, waving people toward the room.
He put each of his hands out, offering assistance to a pair of elderly women who were hobbling through the doorway.
Monica came last with Sherry, a woman in her seventies who’d now gone four days without her arthritis medication. Neil rushed to her side, helping Monica hold her up and move her along.
Something slammed into the main door behind the broken glass.
“Hurry,” Neil said.
Monica helped Sherry down and stepped to the side so that Neil could shut the door. He turned to face the group. The children cried, and the adults chattered amongst themselves. It hadn’t been easy getting all twenty-four of them into the office. The children sat on laps to make room for the adults.
“Quiet,” Neil said, speaking over them.
A sudden stillness settled over the room, broken only by the hushed sound of sobbing children.
Gunshots.
A loud crash.
The intruders had made it inside.
5
Isaac sat in the corner of the office with his arms around Kevin and Darius. They were shaking, their eyes down and their mouths shut. With the boys safe beside him, Isaac’s thoughts drifted to the woman who hadn’t returned.
The men who had broken into the day care center roamed the halls, and they’d eventually get into the administrative office. The animals would find them. Isaac was sure of it. Chloe would finally make her way back, and everyone would be gone, maybe dead. Himself included.
“Isaac, I’m scared,” Kevin, the younger of the two boys, said.
“I know, buddy,” Isaac said in a throaty whisper. “But you have to be quiet, okay?”
The boy nodded and wiped his eyes. Isaac kept a penlight on beneath his shirt, hoping to cast out enough light to make the boy feel safe, but not enough to give them away.
A crash came from the other room. Isaac pulled the boys closer. Several more crashes shook the walls. Isaac pictured tables flipping over, items being tossed across the room and broken against the walls. He closed his eyes, hearing each and every destructive sound.
Isaac glanced at Neil, who had maneuvered near the door and attempted to put his body between the assailants and the people in the room.
“We know you’re in there,” a man said from down the hall. “You left a fucking stench behind. We’re following the smell.”
The men on the other side of the door laughed. Isaac covered the boys’ mouths to keep them from crying out.
“Everyone stay calm,” Neil said.
They heard the double doors at the end of the hall being flung open, slamming against the adjacent walls. A man whistled along with a rhythmic tapping.
Isaac pictured a large man holding a crowbar in his hand, lightly tapping it against the wall as he made his way toward the administrative office.
The man stopped whistling before opening each door in the hallway. Each time the man went quiet, Isaac closed his eyes and held his breath. He kept his hands over Kevin and Darius’ mouths. Isaac could feel their stifled screams, their warm breath making his palms sweat.
“I know y’all be in one of these rooms. You may as well come out. It’ll be a lot easier for you if I don’t have to dig you out of your hole. We want the cash in your safe and the cripple who let our bitches out. Give us those, and we won’t hurt nobody.”
Neil scanned the room, his eyes jumping from one scared face to another. He used his head to point at the door and spoke.
“Maybe we let them have the cash box. It’s not like we’re going to need it for anything. Food is more important to us now than cash.”
“No,” Isaac said. “We can’t give up. They might hurt us anyway. And they know about Chloe.”
“I’m with Neil,” Marie said.
“We can’t do that,” Barb said. “We have to stay here.”
A low, measured tap came from the other side of the door. Everyone inside the administrative office fell silent.
Isaac didn’t say another word.
The door handle wiggled.
Several women in the room gasped.
The door handle wiggled again, this time with the lever moving rapidly in the lockset. Isaac looked around the room, holding his finger to his lips to urge the others to be quiet.
“They’re all in here. Every fucking one of them.”
A few of the children began to cry.
“Stay calm, guys,” Isaac said.
The sound of footsteps echoed off the tiled hallway, stopping in front of the administrative office door.
“Open the door.”
Isaac hadn’t heard this voice yet. It sounded softer than the man who had been taunting them.
“It’s going to be painful if you don’t. If you give up, we promise we won’t hurt anyone. Maybe we’ll put y’all to work, but we won’t hurt ya.”
The door slammed open, nearly hitting Isaac. Five men entered the room, each armed with assault rifles.
“Get your hands in the fucking air,” one of the men shouted.
Isaac took a deep breath and looked around. Everyone in the room raised their hands. The kids screamed as the gunmen pointed their ARs at them, shouting obscenities. Isaac saw their mouths moving but couldn’t hear what they were saying. A low hum filled his ears, and the men appeared to be moving in slow motion.
Two hands yanked him up by the collar and Isaac stared into the sweaty face of a man with missing teeth and breath that smelled like sour milk. The gunman screamed at Isaac, spittle hitting him in the face. He looked at the man with wide eyes and trembling lips. A hand cracked the side of Isaac’s face, and the fiery pain jolted him from the stupor. The crying and shouting came rushing back into Isaac’s ears like a tidal wave. The barrel of an automatic rifle appeared in his face.
“You’ve got five seconds to raise your hands, son.”
“Please, leave him be,” Neil said.
Another of the intruders hit Neil with an open-handed slap, knocking him to the ground.
“Okay, okay,” Isaac said, raisi
ng his hands.
The gunman dropped the barrel and grabbed Isaac by the shirt, tossing him into the hallway.
“Everyone out here. Right fucking now.”
Isaac kept his hands in the air as the day care’s tenants filed out of the room. The elderly hobbled as quickly as they could, but the gunmen yelled at them anyway.
“They’re old,” Isaac said. “We’ll have to help them out.”
A deep, low chuckle emerged from a dark corner. An African-American man walked through the room as if each footstep was syncopated with a kick drum only he could hear. He wore a Pittsburgh Pirates baseball cap pulled down tight over his forehead, and a thin, precise mustache above his top lip. A simple black hoodie clung to his fit frame.
The man looked into Isaac’s face. He didn’t blink, and Isaac had to look away.
“You’re not the leader of this group, I hope. You’re far too scared.”
Isaac’s lips quivered as a smile formed on the man’s face.
“I’m the leader,” Neil said.
The man turned his head away from Isaac for a moment, then shot him one more glance before he stood and walked toward Neil.
“You? You might’ve been my third or fourth guess.”
“What do you want?” Neil asked.
One of the men backhanded him across the face. Neil grabbed his cheek.
“The hot cripple and the cash. And whatever else we want to take…But you don’t get to ask me shit,” the gang leader said. “My name is Charles, but I’ma be nice and let you call me Chuck.” He turned to Neil. “What’s your name?”
“Neil.”
“Nice to meet you, Neil. Now, tell me, where is she?”
Neil shook his head.
“You don’t know?”
“No,” Neil said. “She left days ago, and she hasn’t come back, I swear.”
Isaac thought again of Chloe as Neil talked to Chuck. Neil was telling the truth, and Isaac sure hoped she wasn’t on her way back. These men knew her, and they expected her to return to the group.
His head ached, but his mind began to clear from the shot to the head.
As Chuck continued to question Neil, Isaac looked around the room and noted the positions of the other gunmen. A man to his left had a handgun in a holster. Isaac thought he was quick enough to get it. He imagined himself rolling across the ground and yanking the gun from the holster, rising to his feet and pressing the barrel to the man’s skull. He could then hold the man hostage until they let him and his friends go. It was the kind of plan that would work in the movies, but Isaac knew he’d be shot dead before he’d be able to get the gun out of the man’s holster.
“Leave the old folks and babies. They’ll slow us down,” Chuck said to his henchmen. “Everyone else comes with us. Go take a look around and see if there’s anything here worth taking with us.”
Neil looked back and forth between Isaac and Chuck.
“We can’t leave these people here,” Neil said.
“They’re not worth anything to us,” Chuck said. “The teenagers can be sold to the pimps. You and Boy Wonder over here,” he said, gesturing at Isaac, “you’ll work for us until we decide to let you go.”
Marie stood up. “You can’t leave us here alone. These babies need someone to stay, to take care of them.”
“Don’t cause more problems, Marie. These men have guns.”
“What about the children? They’ll starve to death.”
“Okay,” Chuck said. “You’re right. They can’t stay here by themselves. You’ll stay with them.”
Marie smiled and clasped her hands together in the praying position. “Thank you, sir.”
“Don’t mention it.”
Chuck drew a handgun from his waistband and pointed it at Marie in one motion before pulling the trigger. The bullet slammed into her forehead, sending her backward and into the wall.
Isaac’s eyes watered from the acrid smoke. “Fuck, man.”
The room broke into a chorus of screams and cries.
Chuck dropped his arm and let the smoking gun hang from his hand, his finger still on the trigger. He looked around the room, his eyes meeting Isaac’s as he spoke.
“Anyone else wanna stay?”
6
Chuck lined up Neil and the others and led them out of the daycare center. The gang had two vehicles in the parking lot—a black SUV with window tint so dark that it matched the paint, and a passenger van that had belonged to the day care center, still sporting the faded Love n’ Play Day Care logo on the side.
“How much gas is in that thing?” Chuck asked one of his men.
“Almost full,” the man said. “Can’t believe no one siphoned it yet.”
“Lucky us.” Chuck walked over to the van and patted the hood. “She’s exactly what we need to round up more workers for the operation.”
Neil swallowed, knowing exactly what Chuck meant by “operation.”
Chuck raised his chin and yelled above the worried conversation. “All right. Get your asses in there. All of you. Now.”
Neil stood at the back of the line, watching as the rest of the group climbed into the passenger van, less than half of those who had been living in the day care center. The younger children struggled to get in, and Neil feared Chuck might lose his patience and kill one of them. But the gang member near the door grabbed them by the arms and forced them inside.
Neil reached the door and was about to get into the van when a hand gripped his arm tightly around his bicep.
Chuck.
“You’re a good man for doing what I told you to do. I don’t want to hurt you or any more of your people. Continue to do as I say, and I won’t have to. But understand this—I own you now. You got that?”
Neil stared into the man’s dark eyes, pausing for a moment. How had he allowed the group to be captured by this monster?
Neil nodded.
“Good. You’re a smart man.” His hand squeezed Neil’s arm a little harder before spinning him back toward the van. “Now get inside. And I’ll see you in a bit, after our little drive.”
Chuck gestured toward one of the other men to follow him over to the SUV and drive. Chuck hopped into the back seat.
As the van pulled away, Neil looked out of the window at the day care center one last time. He’d thought he had found the perfect safe place to camp until the National Guard came through.
He lowered his head.
For whatever reason, these people had trusted him. They had made him their leader. And now here they were, speeding away from a safe house, taken prisoner by some gang that had already proved they would kill anyone at any moment. And depending on what Chuck had meant by “operation,” he might’ve wished for that fate.
A sniffle pulled Neil from his thoughts. Charlotte, one of the middle-aged women in their group, wept beside him.
“Where are they taking us, Wayne?”
Wayne was the name of Charlotte’s late husband. Neil wasn’t sure when Charlotte had arrived at the day care center. The woman had stumbled in wearing a grease-stained sweater and carrying a blue plastic bag full of bottle caps. She looked older than she most likely was and Charlotte mumbled the same phrases, over and over again. Neil noticed it only when the woman felt agitated or stressed.
“I’m not sure,” Neil said.
Kevin and Darius laughed, teasing each other and not fully understanding the seriousness of the situation.
“I hope we’re going to the mountains. Remember the time we went to the Poconos and stayed in that cabin?”
“Shut up back there,” the man driving said, holding up a pistol with his right hand while steering with his left.
Neil wrapped his arm around Charlotte, pulling her head into his chest. He patted her shoulder and looked around to the others, unsure of what he could do now to comfort any of them.
The driver wove through city streets covered in trash and debris. Neil saw the street signs as they passed by—Esplanade Avenue, Canal Street, Poydras. So
me people ran by, and others lay motionless on the sidewalk. Broken glass littered the streets, shining in the sun with an obscene brilliance. Fires burned within buildings, black smoke billowing from open windows. The air reeked of burnt rubber. Suddenly Neil realized he’d been so enamored by what he’d seen through the window that he’d lost track of their route.
The driver pulled the van into an alley. The door swung open. A man stood on the pavement, dressed all in black and holding an assault rifle.
“Get out.”
The children climbed out of the van first, followed by the adults. The man grabbed Charlotte by the arm and pulled her out.
Isaac stepped out and faced the man.
“She’s messed up in the head. What is your prob—”
The man backhanded Isaac, knocking the boy to the ground. The sound reverberated off the brick walls surrounding the alley, the slap sounding like a footfall on wet asphalt. The women gasped as the man placed a black combat boot on Isaac’s chest before putting the barrel of the rifle in the boy’s face.
“Say that shit again.”
Isaac’s hands shook as he held them up.
“There’s no need for this,” Neil said. “We’re doing exactly what you want. Let him up, and we’ll go inside.”
The man kept the rifle in Isaac’s face while turning to glare at Neil, and he took a deep breath as the man’s boot came off the boy’s chest.
“Talk back again—any of you—and you’re dead. Now get the fuck up.”
Isaac pushed himself up off the ground, patting the dirt off the front of his pants. The man then led him and Neil through a heavy steel door.
The darkness clung to the inside of the building like thick smoke, the smell of wet mold hanging in the stale air. Neil saw a few women shuffle by, all wearing plain, dark clothes. They walked down a long hallway, casting shadows on the walls.
Three armed men led the group through a narrow hallway and down a set of stairs. Broken glass cracked beneath his feet. Neil looked up to see the bulbs missing from the light fixtures. He held onto the railing and turned to look at the children. Monica walked behind Kevin and Darius. The boys had been crying but trying to hide their tears and appear tougher than they were.
