It was not a meeting Dolores looked toward without apprehension, the first sentence read on the yellowed page, nor was it one she could dismiss without a great weight on her conscience. Heavy of heart, she trudged up the steps to her family’s townhouse.
Obviously an uplifting piece. I squared my shoulders and forged onward.
Dolores, who appeared to be the heroine of the story, sat down to dinner with her parents in a shabby room. She reflected on her childhood spent in that same room, with her mother barking orders at her and kicking her when she didn’t understand the expected tasks, her father smacking her around when he came home drunk. In the current moment, her mother wheedled her for money and called her a disgrace of a daughter in much more elaborate and vulgar language when she said she had none to spare. Her father hurled his mug at her head and then slammed her face into the tabletop so hard she stumbled out of the apartment with a broken, bleeding nose.
That was the chapter. As I read it, a detached part of my brain made snarky commentary about how maudlin the scene was, how pathetic Dolores’s willingness to spend any time with these people in the first place, and what an over-the-top attempt it was to tug on the readers’ heartstrings. But at the same time, with each passing sentence, fragments from my own past stirred to the surface.
My birth mother, shoving me to the side into a hot radiator and not even glancing over at my shriek while she’d been intent on upending the apartment in search of that hit she was sure she still had. My first foster father, making me stand naked in front of him every morning before I got dressed so he could “inspect” me—never touching, but his eyes crawling over my skin like worms. My second foster mother, ramming my head into a sink of hot, soapy water and holding it there until I nearly blacked out, because she didn’t think I was washing the dishes thoroughly enough. When I was four, then five, then eight.
I pushed the memories aside like I’d learned to do so long ago it’d become instinctive. The past was past. It couldn’t hurt me now. I hoped those fuckers rotted in hell, and that was all the thought they were worth. But by the time I’d finished the chapter, more fragments were clamoring to the surface so quickly I couldn’t fend them all off. Raised hands, harsh voices, shards of pain. More and more, until they drowned out the words on the page.
I dropped the book on the floor and stomped my foot on the cover as if the memories were coming from inside it, as if I could hold them back that way. My breath came out shaky. I hugged myself, blinking away flashes of images.
Think of the good things instead. Think of Cade’s smile that first day when he’d welcomed me. Think of the “fort” we’d staked out as ours between the leaning maple and the old backyard shed. Think of the flowers I’d coaxed into blooming outside the Monroes’ house. Think of—
Another girl’s giggle rose up from the depths of my mind, severing those moments. The remembered sound set my teeth on edge in an instant. A flick of dyed black hair and a glimpse of kohl-lined eyes. A sniffle and a sob.
Fuck, no. I pressed my hands to my eyes so hard the heels dug in. The stinging right there in the present dulled the memories a little. I added the jiggling of my feet against the ground, the press of my teeth into my lip until a thread of blood seeped over my tongue.
When the barrage finally faded, I felt as wrung out as if I’d been running for my life. I picked up the book gingerly and marched it back to its spot. The uneasiness lingered even if the images weren’t hitting me so forcefully now.
I had to do something else, something now, something real.
On my way to the library door, the electric lights snapped off. I froze in the sudden darkness. It took a moment for understanding to sink in. I must have been in the room for longer than I’d realized. At eleven o’clock each night, the lights in all the common areas shut off as if on a timer.
Perfect timing for me to get a little investigating in.
I slipped out into the hall and down to the first floor, but this time I walked right past the dean’s office, as well as the row of paintings. I’d been meaning to figure out what Professor Hubert might have been up to in the basement earlier today. Maybe I’d find some bigger answers down there.
As I descended the steps into the cooler air, I used my phone for light. The concrete walls looked eerie in the thin glow. My shoes scraped the rough floor with each step.
The laundry room stood right at the base of the stairs. Beyond that I found a furnace room, a supply room full of old desks and chairs, and… the hall ended there.
I turned on my heel, frowning, searching the walls as if I might have missed an entire doorway on my first pass. This space couldn’t have filled more than a third of the total area of the building. What kind of place only had a fraction of a basement?
A place that had a second section of basement that could only be accessed somewhere else?
I’d already explored this side of the first floor pretty thoroughly. A cursory check confirmed that there were no staircases or doors I’d missed. But then, if we were talking about a whole different side to the basement, its entrance would probably be on the other side of the building, right?
I’d only walked through the staff hallway once to check that it was all professors’ offices—and, I supposed, their accommodations. It was possible I’d missed something there.
I slunk down that hallway, setting my feet carefully on the thick rug. The light from my phone glanced off the name plaques on the doors: Wainhouse, Marsden, Hubert, Carmichael, Filch, and a few others.
As the light passed over the door at the farthest end of the hall, I paused. In daylight, I’d taken the plaques to be pretty identical. The deeper shadows and the tone of the light brought out something different in that one. It had a tarnish to it the others didn’t, and the edges of the letters were slightly worn down, as if the others had all been replaced more recently but no one had bothered with this one.
Bushfell, it said. I definitely hadn’t heard anyone mention that name.
It could still be a professor whose class I wasn’t scheduled for. Maybe the mysterious counselor? I could get in deep shit pushing farther. But how cautious could I afford to be when the teachers were literally poisoning us?
I leaned close to the door to listen for any sounds of activity on the other side. Then I fished the reward card I’d been carrying since last night out of my pocket and jammed it beside the door to jimmy the lock.
Thank the Lord for this aged building. The card did the trick on my first try. I eased the door open, ready to retreat the second I saw any sign that the room on the other side was occupied—
It wasn’t a room. Beyond the doorway, a flight of stairs led down to a small landing.
My heart skipped a beat. I’d been right.
Breath sharp in my throat, I treaded down the concrete steps. The narrow walls closed around me. My phone’s light quivered and seemed to dim slightly.
All that waited at the bottom of the steps in the pool of still, chilly air was another door. This one, my card didn’t stand a chance against. The left side of the frame was bare, with the hinges presumably facing the other way, and the right side had a broad hasp-and-staple clasp with a heavy padlock holding it in place. From the patina on the lock, it’d been securing this entrance for a long time.
Who went to this much work to fortify a door that was already behind another locked—and disguised—door?