Catacomb

by Madeleine Roux

  “That’s fine,” Abby said. “Thanks for helping us out.” Dan had no idea how she could keep up such a bright demeanor while she tried to maneuver the tire into the flatbed of the truck. Dan dashed over to help, and then Jordan joined, too.

  “No trouble at all,” Jake said.

  Dan hoped this was just friendly Southern hospitality at work. He couldn’t help feeling a creepy vibe from this guy and his willingness to help them. But it was already getting dark, and if they had to walk back to the car with that heavy tire it would take them way too long.

  They piled into the front cab of the truck, Jordan whimpering from the sudden onslaught of about sixteen car fresheners stuffed behind the rearview mirror. “Maybe I’d rather walk,” he whispered. “What smell do you think he’s trying to cover up?”

  “I’d rather not think about it,” Dan whispered back.

  Jake Lee drove them back up the road, humming softly as they went. When that started to get weird, he turned on the radio, and bluegrass blasted out of the tinny speakers, so loud and frantic it immediately gave Dan a headache.

  Abby remained all smiles, hopping out of the truck when they reached the Neon. Without prompting, Jake Lee parked and lowered the gate on the truck bed, grunting and sweating as he pulled the spare onto the gravel ditch.

  “Here now,” he said, lumbering back to the cab and getting an enormous flashlight. “Take this. You can give it back to me when you get in to the diner for supper.”

  “That’s really nice of you,” Abby said, fetching the little tool kit and jack from the back of the car. Dan heard her sigh at the sight of the sleeping bag rolled up where the spare tire ought to be. He took up the position of spotlight operator, holding the big yellow bulb steady while Abby set to work.

  He glanced at Jake Lee, who had paused on the way back to his truck to watch them. More than watch them, really—he was staring, his head cocked to the side like he’d just discovered a rare species of insect and was trying to decide what to do with it. Dan tried to give a friendly wave to get his attention, but the mechanic just frowned and shook his head before driving off into the night.

  The tire change was taking longer than Dan expected. His arms were beginning to cramp from holding the flashlight steady.

  “If I were a straight guy,” Jordan said, “this would be a total turn-on.” He took off his thick, fashionable glasses and wiped at his nose and forehead with his arm.

  “Then not for the first time, I’m glad you’re not straight,” Dan said. “Jordan, you could at least try to help.”

  “I’d just get in the way,” he said.

  Abby gave a tiny grunt of effort, wrenching off another of the blown tire’s lug nuts.

  “Good thing that car only weighs about sixteen pounds max,” Jordan added. This was met with a swift, blind kick from Abby, who was now pressed up against the car’s faded, electric-green chassis.

  “At least one of us knows how to change a freaking tire!” she shot back. Her forearms and face were streaked with war-paint lines of grease and dirt.

  “Thanks, Mr. Valdez!” Dan said, crouching to see what she was working on. She had at last managed to maneuver the replacement into alignment. The only thing left to do was tighten the nuts on the spare.

  “Thanks, Mrs. Valdez,” Abby countered. “She’s the one who insisted I learn this before even considering a road trip.”

  “Here,” Dan offered, holding out his hand for the wrench. “Let me finish this.”

  “Are you sure?” she asked. She puffed back a wisp of purple hair. She had dyed a few streaks at the beginning of summer, and now her naturally black hair was encroaching down toward the roots.

  “I think I can handle it,” Dan said. “Righty tighty, lefty loosey? Anyway, the blood is running out of my arms. You take the flashlight.”

  They changed places, Dan kneeling next to the car while Abby positioned the flashlight to shine down onto his head and the tire. Tightening the tire onto the car was harder work than he expected, and he had to grip the wrench with both hands to gather enough force. Finally, he had to lower the car jack so he could finish.

  “Wow, Jordan is right,” Abby said. “That is kind of a turn-on.”

  Dan blushed, ruffling his hair shyly. “I think we’re good to go. Let’s get this stuff in the trunk and get back to the diner, yeah? I’m starving.”

  “If you insist,” Jordan said with a sigh, helping Dan pack up the flashlight and tool kit. “At this point I’d prefer McDonald’s. That mechanic was just a little too eager to help.”

  “I think he was nice,” Abby said, climbing back into the driver’s seat.

  “Ugh. Careful,” Jordan replied with a shudder. “I wouldn’t let him hear you say that.”

  When they returned to the diner, the atmosphere once again became quiet, almost chilly. Jake Lee was nowhere to be found, but the lights were still out in the garage next door, so Dan held on to the flashlight.

  The service at the Mutton Chop was slow, although apparently not for the other tables. Dan watched platters of food come and go, but the only thing that had made it to their table was a cup of coffee for Abby, delivered by a man whose nametag read Fats Buckhill. Dan hadn’t even gotten his water yet. Abby tapped her ringed fingers on the surface of the table and offered a friendly smile whenever Mr. Fats, the owner-slash-waiter-slash-horror-movie-extra, hobbled by the table, but he just kept saying, “I’ll be right with you.”

  To be fair, for almost 9:00 p.m., the diner was surprisingly busy. Dan could swear every local in the joint was staring at them, but whenever he turned to see, they whipped back around, suddenly very interested in their food.

  “This is how it starts,” Jordan hissed, leaning in to get closer to Dan. Abby ignored him. “First that mechanic. There’s always the one gruff yokel who warns you or has that hee-haw donkey laugh, and then everyone in the movie theater is all, Get out! Get the hell out of there! What are you even thinking?”

  Dan snorted. Abby’s sharp elbow founds its way into his ribs, but even she had a smile for Jordan’s joke.

  “Laugh it up,” Jordan continued, all but hiding behind the big, laminated menu. “Who do you think they’ll kill and feed to the pigs first? Duh, me. Of course they’ll bump off the gay kid first. That’s like redneck murder one-oh-one.”

  “That’s just judgmental,” Abby replied, sipping her jet-fuel coffee. It was one of her only vices—Dan had lost count of how many cups of coffee she’d had so far this trip. But if it kept her awake for the drive, more power to her. They still had a few hours to go tonight before they made it to the next campsite. “You don’t know these people, Jordan, and even if they are a little less . . . cosmopolitan, there’s nothing wrong with that. Your way of life isn’t better or worse.”

  “False,” Jordan declared, lowering his voice when he spotted the owner returning to check on them. “My way of life is objectively better because mine has Wi-Fi and Netflix.”

  “How y’all doin’ here, then?” Fats Buckhill crouched to bring himself down to the table’s level. His old knees cracked ominously as he did so, loud and crisp as breaking twigs. He had wide-set, friendly eyes under a heavy brow and a salt-and-pepper beard that was neat and closely shaven. One eye was slightly milky, the other crystal blue.

  “Really good, Mr. Buckhill,” Abby said politely. “I’m going to be getting the Cobb, and these two . . .” She trailed off, eyeing them impatiently.

  “Burger,” Jordan said shortly. His hand hovered in front of his mouth, probably trying to cover up his new piercing so the locals wouldn’t judge him. “Bacon burger. Tons of bacon, just really go for it. And a milk shake if you’ve got ’em. Chocolate.”

  Fats laughed at that, cocking his head back. “Oh, I like you, son. You got good old-fashioned tastes.”

  Dan felt Abby’s elbow jab preemptively, but that didn’t stop his incredulous smile. “Oh, yes,” Dan said with as much sincerity as he could muster, “Jordan is about as traditional as they come.�
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  That earned him a kick under the table from both of them.

  “The pulled pork and potato salad for me,” Dan said, vowing to humor Abby and be less of a smart ass. “A Coke, too. And maybe a slice of the chess pie for later.”

  “Another sound decision-maker.” Fats stood, his knees crackling again, and swept up their menus, tapping all three together like a deck of cards on the table.

  “If it’s not too much trouble,” Abby added, clearing her throat resolutely, “would you mind sitting down to talk for a little while? I’m working on a photo project and it won’t be complete without some insight from the people who actually live in and love these places.”

  She was laying it on thick, but it worked. Fats’s one good eye twinkled. “Why of course, that’d be just fine. Let me put these orders in with Fats Junior and then I’ll be right back to oblige you.”

  The old man shuffled away, perhaps with a bit more spring in his step now. The hush of the restaurant grew less pronounced, as if some secret signal that the teenagers were all right had been given.

  “Did you see how cheery he got?” Jordan murmured. He kept his eyes glued to Fats. “Old fart’s just excited I’m eating all that bacon. Gonna get me nice and plump before the slaughter.”

  Abby rolled her eyes and took a long swig from her coffee. “Well, after the year we’ve had, I understand why you’re nervous, but we’ve earned some peace and quiet, Jordan,” she said. “Some normalcy.”

  “Don’t say shit like that. Don’t! That’s like catnip for bad juju.”

  Dan had already decided to stay out of it when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. Probably Sandy getting worried that he hadn’t called her yet today. He checked his messages, finding the alert hadn’t come from a text but from his Facebook app. Dan couldn’t imagine who would be messaging him on Facebook. There wasn’t anyone from his high school he planned to keep in touch with. Could it be one of his fellow freshman class members at Chicago saying hello?

  He flicked the app open with his thumb, half-listening to his friends squabble. Fats returned, leaning onto the edge of the booth frame to chitchat with Abby.

  Dan tabbed over to his inbox, feeling his hand freeze into a numb vice around the phone.

  This wasn’t right. Or okay. Or possible.

  “Jimmy Orsini operated up and down this route during Prohibition, didn’t he?” Abby was saying, and she even pulled out a photograph to show the restaurant owner. But she might as well have been speaking in tongues. “My teacher Mr. Blaise grew up around here, and he was telling me all about how interesting Orsini’s grave is. I was going to try and get there, to photograph it. That’s sort of my thing right now. Photography, I mean, not graves.”

  Fats’s reply sounded distant, too, and Dan realized it was because his blood was pumping so loudly in his ears it was making it hard to hear. “I wouldn’t recommend photographing that, little miss. Never know what that kind of thing might stir up. Bad energies and the like. There’s a downright shivery ghost story about Orsini and his gang. The gravestone’s in Alabama, sure enough, but the Pinkertons gave ’em hell all up and down this route—finally caught ’em down in New Orleans. Orsini got himself shot up in an escape attempt.”

  Yes. Ghost stories. Ghosts. That word at last pierced his brain. Dan stared down at the message and its sender, and he soundlessly mouthed the words back to himself.

  Micah Bonheur

  da Niel dani el

  areu there ill

  be se eing you real so on.

  The food arrived while he was still staring down at his phone, but his appetite had fled. Prank, he thought. I’ll kill whoever did this. His palms grew sweaty around the phone until he shoved it into his pocket. Out of sight, out of mind.

  “You okay?”

  Jordan stared at him, squinting while he sucked down his milk shake. Shrugging, Dan pushed a fork halfheartedly through his potato salad. He couldn’t explain the message from Micah, especially not there, with Abby still chatting away with Fats. Now she was taking notes, scribbling names and places in between bites while the old man pulled up a chair next to the booth, apparently cozy enough for a long visit.

  “Not sure the food’s agreeing with me,” Dan finally whispered. Just the smell of it made him sick now, anxiety turning his guts to acid.

  Who would be cruel enough to play a prank like this? Certainly not Abby or Jordan, and as far as he knew, his twisted old roommate, Felix, was still locked away. He doubted the institution would let him have access to the internet, let alone social media. The only living person left who knew both Dan and Micah was Cal, a friend of Micah’s from NHC who’d been a total dick to Dan and his friends last fall—to put it mildly. But according to Jordan, Cal had done a complete 180 in the months since then. Dan’s mind spun, coming up empty.

  “Can’t blame you,” Jordan said. “That potato salad looks kinda rancid. Want some of my fries?”

  “Oh, uh, sure, yeah.” He couldn’t go through this again, lying to his friends. They always seemed to find out anyway. He’d tell them later, when they were alone. Dan forced a smile and took one of Jordan’s fries. Then he rifled through his bag, grabbed his meds, and choked down one of the little blue pills with his soda. His disorder always got worse when he was feeling especially anxious.

  “Long car rides make me sorta queasy, too,” Jordan added. Then, all at once, he seemed to realize that the look on Dan’s face had nothing to do with the food or the car ride. “Dan, what’s wrong? It’s something else, isn’t it?”

  Wasn’t it always?

  Dan scraped for an answer, his heartbeat speeding up. “I brought one of the files.” Glancing at Abby, he lowered his voice. “You know, the files? I know we sorted through most of it at NHC, but I had to make sure I had seen it all. Because of my family history, you know?”

  Jordan went a little green, lowering his milk shake. His big, dark eyes grew bigger behind his curly fringe. “Oh.”

  “Yeah. There’s stuff in there about my dad, maybe my mom, too, but I can’t be sure. I already went through it all, and I didn’t really find anything concrete, just more dead ends.”

  “Why were their files mixed up in the professor’s things?” Jordan whispered.

  Dan gulped. He really hadn’t meant to do this right here, right now, but now that he’d started talking, it was like this confession had been building behind a dam in his brain, waiting for the opportunity to be released.

  “Remember how Professor Reyes said there were things I could see that other people couldn’t?”

  “I don’t know—maybe? There was a lot going on that night.”

  “Well, I . . . You know what, never mind.”

  “Hey, I mean, if you need to talk about it,” Jordan started, but suddenly Dan wasn’t ready for that. This was not the right time, with Abby having a congenial conversation on one side and with hours still to go before another night in a tent.

  “We should get going,” he blurted, looking outside to find the kind of countryside darkness that was so dense it felt oppressive, even through glass. “It’s late, and we wanted to get an early start tomorrow, right?”

  Dan said it loudly enough for Abby to hear. She cleared her throat, glaring.

  Luckily, Jordan was tired enough to yawn or loyal enough to fake it. “I’m beat, too, and we still have tents to set up.”

  Outnumbered, Abby gave in, but not before thanking Fats for all his time and information. She frowned at the boys as if they were in on some conspiracy against her. Which, technically, they were.

  Dan gave her an apologetic smile. “Oh, Mr. Buckhill,” he said, catching the man before he made it back to the kitchen. “Could you please give this flashlight to Jake Lee? We tried to catch him next door but the sign said he’d be over here.”

  Fats smiled. “Well, I would if I knew who Jake Lee was.”

  “Jake Lee . . . the mechanic?” Dan said, but his stomach was already twisting with dread. The realization dawned on him wi
th sickening clarity: Jake had never asked them to pay for the tire.

  “That man over there, Greg Mackey—if you need a mechanic, he’s your guy.”

  Dan, Abby, and Jordan all looked at one another in silence. Gathering their bags quickly, they left the flashlight and a generous tip on the table before running out to the car and the night.

  “So what’s our next stop tomorrow? You got any more side trips planned, Abs?” Jordan asked. They were trying to keep the mood light, but they were all thoroughly spooked. The headlights on the Neon picked up little beyond the oncoming road, the occasional sign, and the flashes of trees running just beyond the curb. “Not sure how much more of Tennessee I can take.”

  “Alabama,” Abby corrected.

  “Tennebamatucky, whatever. They all look the same at this point.”

  “We’re still just outside Montgomery, Jordan, use your GPS,” Abby snapped. Then she took a deep breath. “I guess the scenery was kind of similar all day, but that’s what I’m going for with my project,” she explained. “I bet when I line my photos up next to shots from thirty, forty, even a hundred years ago, there won’t be much of a difference. I think it’s fascinating. Time goes on but nothing really changes in some places. Kind of a nice thought, right? That some things are actually permanent. Reliable . . .”

  She trailed off, her voice growing a little sad.

  “Sure,” Jordan said. “I get that. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t put me to sleep, but I hear you.”

  “You had better be awake now,” Dan said. “You’re helping set up the tent when we make it to the campground.”

  “I can’t wait to get to Mobile tomorrow.” Abby pressed on, slowing the car as signs for the Woods Campground flashed by in the headlights. “The Magnolia Cemetery is supposed to be a gold mine—so many incredible mausoleums there. Mr. Blaise said I can’t miss it. I promise we won’t stop long. I know we’re all anxious to get to New Orleans after . . .” Abby shivered. “Ugh, I need a shower.”

  Dan sat silently in the back, wishing he knew the right thing to say to make everything okay again. But all he could think about was Micah’s message.