To read Part One, please click here.
We always remember the moment right before everything changes. Mundane actions become remarkable when they are the last of their kind. They waver over the rift between “before” and “after,” clashing with the strangeness to come.
So it was that the gentle click of that door opening inward always felt far more real to me than what was hiding behind.
At first glance, however, I had just found another old closet full of unwanted junk, a shadowed cavity in this hulking beast of a theater. I almost didn’t look close enough, I almost didn’t see. For she was tucked between racks of costumes, hanging upside down like an old coat herself, with the stillness of non-sentience.
It was her too-pale skin that made me stop. It glowed a little in the beam of my flashlight, distinguishing itself from the otherwise murky color palette of that cramped space.
“Huh,” I thought benignly, “there’s a dead body in here.”
Then my rib cage constricted and horror spread through me. I stumbled back, aware for the first time of how my footsteps resounded through that vacant concrete hallway.
I understand that this is the moment when most people would flee back into the sunlight. I know that according to conventional wisdom, you’re supposed to withdraw when the adventure turns sinister. But I couldn’t help myself. I looked closer.
I stared the way one might look at a gruesome old photo of a Civil War battlefield. Except this was real and right in front of me and I couldn’t turn away.
Somehow she was hanging upside down like a bat, suspended by a pair of feet that were lost in the cluttered shadows, her long, dark, greasy hair barely touching the floor. Her clothes (a pair of jeans and some punk band T-shirt) were form-fitting, so they didn’t hang embarrassingly over her head — though I supposed those types of things didn’t matter so much once you had died.
I’d imagined that in death people often wear calm and distant expressions. Like they had ascended somewhere and the mortal world is no longer their concern. But not this girl. She looked like she was sleeping through a particularly stressful dream. There was a certain tension to her features, a stiff resolution in her jaw.
Her expression twisted my gut, reminding me that she wasn’t very much older than I was, and now she would never age another year. I lowered my flashlight, feeling a little ashamed of my morbid curiosity. This wasn’t darkly exciting; it was just sad. And her hiding place was so sickeningly neat, like she wasn’t a person at all, but a folder left forgotten in some filing cabinet.
I should go to the police. I needed to leave this place with its stale air and secrets.
I was moving to close the door when she opened her eyes.
There was no groggy awakening or confusion. Her consciousness just snapped back into place like a released rubber band. We watched each other for a split second, her eyes round as a cornered fox, shifty and dangerous, not quite of this world.
I recoiled, startling myself with a scream, which to my mounting horror, she repeated back.
The girl crashed to the floor, landing awkwardly on her side. My flashlight slipped from my unfeeling fingers, plunging us into a flashing darkness.
I watched as her shadowy arm reached out, grasped the handle, and pulled the door firmly shut, resealing herself inside. The ringing aftermath of our shouts receded in my ears. Silence came streaming back from every secluded corner and hollow of the old theater.
I sat down, or rather, I submitted to gravity, allowing the earth to drag me to the ground. My heart took many long moments to lose its momentum. I was simply a vessel for its pounding as I watched the door, which radiated a coiled quiet, full of warning.
Slowly, rational thoughts began to reestablish themselves in my mind. First and foremost: thank God I hadn’t found a dead body! My stomach unwound a little at the thought, that bitter anxiety diffusing to the wind.
And yet. Shouldn’t she be dead? She had been so motionless, so painfully alabaster, and I had been so sure. Now, though, if I strained my ears, I could hear ragged breathing from behind that innocuous door.
It left me feeling off-balance, like the laws of the universe had been plucked, tested, and the reverberations were ringing through me.
I took a full, slow breath of stale air. Then another. I reminded myself that the darkness was my sword and shield, my friend. I even managed to feel chagrined about my cry. I wasn’t a screamer. I prided myself on befriending the house spiders and allowing them to wander over my skin.
This girl was strange all right, but I was armed with a flashlight and my wits. I would be fine.
Even so, it took a few moments to speak, to expose myself to that oppressive silence.
“Hello?”
So it was that the gentle click of that door opening inward always felt far more real to me than what was hiding behind.
At first glance, however, I had just found another old closet full of unwanted junk, a shadowed cavity in this hulking beast of a theater. I almost didn’t look close enough, I almost didn’t see. For she was tucked between racks of costumes, hanging upside down like an old coat herself, with the stillness of non-sentience.
It was her too-pale skin that made me stop. It glowed a little in the beam of my flashlight, distinguishing itself from the otherwise murky color palette of that cramped space.
“Huh,” I thought benignly, “there’s a dead body in here.”
Then my rib cage constricted and horror spread through me. I stumbled back, aware for the first time of how my footsteps resounded through that vacant concrete hallway.
I understand that this is the moment when most people would flee back into the sunlight. I know that according to conventional wisdom, you’re supposed to withdraw when the adventure turns sinister. But I couldn’t help myself. I looked closer.
I stared the way one might look at a gruesome old photo of a Civil War battlefield. Except this was real and right in front of me and I couldn’t turn away.
Somehow she was hanging upside down like a bat, suspended by a pair of feet that were lost in the cluttered shadows, her long, dark, greasy hair barely touching the floor. Her clothes (a pair of jeans and some punk band T-shirt) were form-fitting, so they didn’t hang embarrassingly over her head — though I supposed those types of things didn’t matter so much once you had died.
I’d imagined that in death people often wear calm and distant expressions. Like they had ascended somewhere and the mortal world is no longer their concern. But not this girl. She looked like she was sleeping through a particularly stressful dream. There was a certain tension to her features, a stiff resolution in her jaw.
Her expression twisted my gut, reminding me that she wasn’t very much older than I was, and now she would never age another year. I lowered my flashlight, feeling a little ashamed of my morbid curiosity. This wasn’t darkly exciting; it was just sad. And her hiding place was so sickeningly neat, like she wasn’t a person at all, but a folder left forgotten in some filing cabinet.
I should go to the police. I needed to leave this place with its stale air and secrets.
I was moving to close the door when she opened her eyes.
There was no groggy awakening or confusion. Her consciousness just snapped back into place like a released rubber band. We watched each other for a split second, her eyes round as a cornered fox, shifty and dangerous, not quite of this world.
I recoiled, startling myself with a scream, which to my mounting horror, she repeated back.
The girl crashed to the floor, landing awkwardly on her side. My flashlight slipped from my unfeeling fingers, plunging us into a flashing darkness.
I watched as her shadowy arm reached out, grasped the handle, and pulled the door firmly shut, resealing herself inside. The ringing aftermath of our shouts receded in my ears. Silence came streaming back from every secluded corner and hollow of the old theater.
I sat down, or rather, I submitted to gravity, allowing the earth to drag me to the ground. My heart took many long moments to lose its momentum. I was simply a vessel for its pounding as I watched the door, which radiated a coiled quiet, full of warning.
Slowly, rational thoughts began to reestablish themselves in my mind. First and foremost: thank God I hadn’t found a dead body! My stomach unwound a little at the thought, that bitter anxiety diffusing to the wind.
And yet. Shouldn’t she be dead? She had been so motionless, so painfully alabaster, and I had been so sure. Now, though, if I strained my ears, I could hear ragged breathing from behind that innocuous door.
It left me feeling off-balance, like the laws of the universe had been plucked, tested, and the reverberations were ringing through me.
I took a full, slow breath of stale air. Then another. I reminded myself that the darkness was my sword and shield, my friend. I even managed to feel chagrined about my cry. I wasn’t a screamer. I prided myself on befriending the house spiders and allowing them to wander over my skin.
This girl was strange all right, but I was armed with a flashlight and my wits. I would be fine.
Even so, it took a few moments to speak, to expose myself to that oppressive silence.
“Hello?”
To read Part Three, please click here.