The Caller

by Dan Krzyzkowski

  CHAPTER 12

  “JUSTIN, YOU HAVE TO get out of there.” My voice was taut.

  “I’m scared, Leslie.”

  “I know you’re scared, Justin. I’m scared too, but you can’t stay there any longer. It’s too dangerous.”

  “What if they find me?” His voice was tremulous.

  “They won’t find you, believe me. Not if they’re upstairs. They’ll never—”

  “They might hear me, though. Opening the basement door to go down. It’ll be too loud.”

  “Justin, we don’t have a choice. You can’t stay under the kitchen cabinet for another minute.” I paused and then added, “You can make it. I know you can. The basement door is ten feet away.”

  “But, Leslie, the police, you said to wait for—”

  “The police aren’t coming, Justin. Do you understand? No one is coming to help you. If we’re going to get out of this, we’re going to have to do it on our own.”

  I remembered the jewelry box beneath the bed in the master bedroom. Justin and I, in a way, had come full circle, having returned to the predicament from which we’d started. Only this was different, and it was a whole lot worse. I thought, That jewelry box meant little if you think about it. The intruders would have looked under the bed anyhow because they’re tearing the goddamn house apart. That bed is probably upside down as we speak, with furniture strewn everywhere. Justin would have been discovered long ago, maybe even killed …

  It was the safe those men were searching for. They were tossing chairs and sofas in all directions and ripping pictures off the walls. They were hunting for the safe and whatever valuable contents it enclosed … and here it was, embedded into the back wall of the cabinet underneath the kitchen sink. Staying here any longer would be like hiding inside the treasure chest.

  It was absurd, really—Justin’s string of hideouts and the secrets they harbored. Each hiding spot had seemed to elicit a surprise from our collective thought, things we had refused to completely understand or accept in human terms. Your own house can be like your own conscience, I thought matter-of-factly. You never learn what lurks in the corners until you squeeze into them for a close inspection.

  “Ten feet, Justin. All you have to do is go around that center counter, open the basement door, and go down the stairs.”

  “But they’ll hear me opening the door—”

  “No, they won’t,” I insisted, growing impatient. “They’re upstairs moving things. They can’t hear that far. Justin, you have to move. We have no idea when your parents are coming back, and those guys might keep looking until they do find the safe. Do you understand me?”

  There was silence at his end as he channeled everything through his fevered brain—all I’d said, what was at stake, what lay ahead.

  “Do you? It’s important that you agree with me, Justin; believe me. I hate to make you do something you’re afraid to do, you know that, but this is absolutely necessary.”

  He asked, “But what am I gonna do? I don’t have shoes or socks on.”

  And I’m not gonna be able to get home tonight, I thought brutally, so why don’t you just quit your whining? Do you want to live to see tomorrow, or don’t you? Because that’s what this comes to.

  I bit my lip. “You’re going to have to do the best you can, Justin. That’s all I can say for now, and I don’t think we have time to say much more. The snow will hurt your feet like you’ve never known, so you’ll have to run as fast as you can to the nearest house. Can you do that?”

  “But they weren’t home, I told—”

  “But that was over an hour ago,” I pressed. “They’re probably back by now. If not, break a window and get in, or run to the next nearest one. It doesn’t matter where you go, Justin, as much as it does that you get out of your house. Does this make sense to you?”

  “I think so,” he said in a shaky voice. “I’m really scared.”

  “I know, Justin, but things will be fine. Trust me. Just stay quiet like you have all along tonight. You’ve been great up to this point.”

  “Should I go now?”

  “Yes,” I replied smoothly, softly. “Open the cabinet door, take a moment to listen to be sure the downstairs is clear, then step out softly. Don’t make a sound.” I hesitated while those last words sank in. “Are you ready for this?”

  “I think, I guess.”

  “Good. Remember, I’m right here next to you. We’re in this together, right?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Okay,” I told him. “Go.”

  There was silence followed by an audible squeak as the cabinet door swung open. I recognized that inherent cabinet-door squeak right away. My Cyclopean eye assumed command, and Justin’s kitchen seemed to unfold before me like a movie screen. At first there was a terrible, pulsing moment of revelation: the door swinging open, wider and wider … and the child inside me was sure that a pair of filth-encrusted boots would be standing there blocking my way out, a towering hulk of a man looking down with a hard, unforgiving grin, as if he’d heard our conversation all along. The fear of this irrational premonition was quickly mitigated by an empty space of kitchen floor. No boots, no man glaring down. And a stealth silence coupled with the empty kitchen, queerly similar to a quiet before a storm. My Cyclopean eye saw through Justin’s, and for one tense moment, we were sitting there as one, peering out from our sanction, listening alertly as we calculated the accessibility of the close but distant basement door.

  “Everything all right?” I whispered. “They still upstairs?”

  “Yeah,” he whispered back, and that was all I needed. That singular word branched into a handful of perceptions for me. I imagined the thumping sounds of objects being moved on the floor above me, mingled with men’s voices.

  We’re making this ten times harder than it is, I knew. This should be easy. That door is right there, ten paces away …

  “Okay, Justin. Step out now and quietly close the cabinet door behind you. Then tiptoe around the counter to the basement door. This should be easy. We’re nearly free now.”

  I couldn’t hear the cabinet door being shut, which was good, but I did see it. And I saw Justin glancing quickly over his shoulder. He looked one way, then the other, then back again.

  It’s okay, kid. You can make it, I know you can …

  And now he was creeping around the counter, that island in the kitchen. I saw him doing it, felt it. I perceived the cordless phone clutched in one hand against his ear, his free hand sliding across the smooth counter surface, as though to steady him or guide him, around, around …

  Almost there, Justin. Almost there …

  And now, around the corner with the closed basement door straight ahead, looming, waiting to be opened, and a new world waiting to be found. I sensed him pausing, one last apprehensive glance at the three entrances into the kitchen to ensure he wasn’t being observed. A moment of trepidation and then the act, the act itself. In a way I’ll never be able to explain, I knew exactly when the boy made that last make-or-break motion toward the door, and I don’t think he took his eyes off it for a second. The rest of the kitchen—the entire house, for that matter—was pushed out of his mind, making that standing wooden door the sole object rendered in complete clarity.

  He’s there, I thought, and moments later I heard the knob turn. Now he’s turning the knob … and now he’s opening the door … he’s opening it … he’s … yes, and now it’s open, the door is open, and he’s going down.

  “How we doing, Justin? Okay?”

  “Yeah,” he said in a half-panicked voice that revealed his heavy breathing. I heard his feet as he marched quickly down the steps, away from the kitchen, from the house, the lion’s den.

  And he left the basement door open above him, I knew suddenly, but I never bothered to mention it. Nothing, nothing, nothing in the world would have convinced him to go back up
and pull it shut. True, the intruders might notice the open door and realize someone had escaped the house during their raping of it, but Justin would be long gone by then.

  I was seized by the sudden impression of having been trapped in a dark tunnel all this time. Now, with the light at the end of the tunnel shining blessedly ahead, all our fear, worry, and caution were being suppressed by an overwhelming need to get out. My heartbeat accelerated with Justin’s mounting fervor, which massed higher and higher with every step toward safety.

  I no longer heard the soft thumping of stairs underfoot, so I gathered he was standing on the concrete floor of his basement. Standing there in his bare feet and …

  “Justin? Justin, where are you? What’s happening?”

  I heard the sound of moving air. Justin’s voice was raspy when he said, “They came in through the doors, the way I thought.”

  It took me a moment to realize what he was talking about: the Bilco doors were open. The intruders had left them open upon entering the house, and now Justin was staring at them. He was staring, too, at the pile of snow that had drifted on the basement floor and on each of the wood risers leading up, up, and out, where the doors yawned open to the night. The moving air that I heard was the wind of the snowstorm billowing in through the gaping escape hole.

  Justin was standing locked in place, staring at his first visual evidence that his home had been entered.

  “Justin, what are you waiting for?”

  “It’s cold,” he said. I pictured him standing there in his bare feet, shivering.

  “I know, but you’ve got to get out. Go to the nearest house and get in. I don’t care if you have to use a rock to break a window.”

  “Yeah,” he uttered in that shaky voice. In those final moments, I envisioned him peering up the stairs into his kitchen, then back to the open storm doors with the snow blowing in … then back to his kitchen. And now back to the storm doors.

  “Run, Justin,” I told him. “Run! Now!”

  He did, leaving the kitchen and the basement, the perps, and all his clever hiding spots behind. I heard him moan and knew his first bare foot had touched the snow on the floor of his basement. The wind grew exponentially through the receiver. Moments later, it howled.

  He’s outside now; he’s made it that far. He’s climbed the stairs, and he’s in his backyard.

  “Don’t waste a second, Justin!” I yelled, screaming to be heard. “Run fast! Go!”

  The wind had to be powerful out there because it was shrieking through the phone line, making a high-pitched sheee!

  “I am!” he answered, but I could barely hear him. His voice was a whisper over the storm’s wrath. I winced as I imagined him, young, defenseless, and barefoot, holding a cordless phone as he trudged and stumbled through a Connecticut blizzard. I sensed, through the receiver, the icy chill against my cheeks. I felt the millions of bitter snowflakes stinging my eyes and face as the wind surged past me, so cold and numbing.

  That incredible roar of rushing air continued, but as Justin moved farther from his house, away from the main phone housing, our reception deteriorated. Serpents of static began to leap and bound over the shriek of wind. Soon, I’d lose him completely.

  My God, he’ll be on his own out there.

  “Justin!” I screamed. “Can you hear me?” Because my world was funneled into the raging phonescape, I hardly noticed Mary and the others staring wide-eyed at me here in the control room. “Justin, I’m losing you!”

  Static hissed. His voice came through in disjointed slivers. “… can’t h … Leslie … so cold … I …” More static. A gust of wind howled and drowned him out completely.

  Oh God, you’re losing him. He’s moving out of range.

  I suddenly felt helpless. If I couldn’t hear him, it was a sure bet he couldn’t hear me either. He was alone out there, somewhere in the state. If we got disconnected …

  The connection was weakening.

  “Justin, where are you? Can you hear me?” I had the phone pressed against my face. I was hollering into it.

  Static and wind, static and wind. A boy’s voice, small and distant, sounding tens of thousands of miles away: “… ough fence t … yard … st there … eezing, Lesl … can’t … l my feet …”

  He’s moving into his neighbor’s yard, and he can’t feel his feet. That’s what he’s trying to say.

  “Keep going and don’t stop!” I yelled slowly, trying desperately to be heard. “Go right up to the door!”

  “… am … oor … should I just … in?”

  “Don’t even knock if it’s open! Just get out of the cold! Do you hear me?”

  Static lurched, and for a moment, I thought I’d lost him for good. The static was far greater than the howl of the wind now—louder, more frequent, longer. It hissed, crackled, spat. I heard fragments of Justin’s voice slipping through but nothing more.

  “… ere now … ta … le … ft … eet … sh … ome …”

  I felt helplessness creeping over me like cold tentacles. I shuddered, shivered, bit down.

  He’s alone now, and he knows it. He’s out there by himself, freezing to death, and he doesn’t know what to do because he can’t hear me. What can I do now? What can I do?

  I flailed for reason, for an idea, for hope, for anything. My mouth hung open, waiting for something celestial to slide out … but what good would it be if he couldn’t hear it?

  He was talking a lot now—chips of his voice were slipping continuously through the static.

  Think, Leslie, dammit, think. I know you can’t hear, but just try.

  I bit down hard, clenching the top of my scalp with my free palm, my brain in overdrive. They say the human brain is capable of climbing that one extra gear when dire necessity comes calling, and this was one of those moments. Everything was churning up there, working furiously, the wheels spinning and grinding, my pulse galloping, sweat streaming down my temples.

  “… ome … do … o … ld … Les …”

  He’s talking a lot, which must mean he’s there. He’s on the doorstep, but he can’t get in. That has to be it. He’s there, and he’s freezing …

  “… obody … me … re … co … nd … ocked …”

  That was it. My perceptions locked onto those initial sounds: … obody … me …

  Nobody’s home is what he’s trying to say. He’s trying to get through to you to ask what to do next.

  A devil of wind roared him out. Static dragons sizzled.

  I focused my efforts, squeezing everything I had into those dear, precious moments.

  “Justin, can you hear me?”

  “… do … ere … m free … ng …”

  “Justin, get into the house any way you can! Get into the house! Break a window if it’s locked up, just—”

  I was interrupted by a clanging noise that came through the receiver, more prominent than his voice or the wind but garbled by static. I held my mouth open to finish my statement but placed my words on hold, trying to process the new noise. It was a repeating sound. Pounding, clanging …

  He’s banging on something. He’s trying to break in.

  The clanging was still there, loud and static-riddled, and I knew what it was, dammit, but couldn’t bring it into conscious thought.

  “Justin, what is—”

  A pause, and then the sound resumed. He had noticeably stopped speaking, as if having realized that our connection was lost.

  “Justin, what are you doing—”

  The sound continued, again, again, again, and suddenly that huge lightbulb lit up in my head, and a million watts of insight flooded my vision.

  He’s pounding on the door. The door is locked, and he’s knocking on it so hard it sounds like he’s trying to knock it down. He’s out there freezing, trying to get in, trying—

  “Break a window, Justi
n! Break a win—”

  My Cyclopean vision flashed bright and powerful all of a sudden, and I saw him standing barefoot in front of the locked door, and the vision was so crystal clear—

  (the human brain is capable of climbing that one extra gear…)

  —that I suddenly saw his hand fisted around one of those heavy, metallic door-knockers mounted to the heavy oak, and that’s why the banging was so loud. So loud and heavy and clanging-like.

  That one extra gear when necessity comes calling …

  His fist was clenched around it, snow swirling everywhere … and suddenly, with an unthinkable power all its own, my Cyclopean eye flashed again, brilliantly, blindingly, and this time I saw too much. I saw a Bilco door, yes, a Bilco door, and a fence because he’d mentioned a fence, and I saw Justin standing on the front porch. Knocking, pounding, pounding …

  “Justin! Can you hear me? For God’s sake, can you hear me?”

  “… es … dy hom … er … Les—”

  Knock! Knock! Knock!

  My heart was jackhammering, thundering …

  “Justin, what are you holding?”

  “… an’t … in the … se …”

  Knock! Knock! Knock!

  “What do you have in your hand, Justin? Answer me!”

  Knock! Knock! Knock!

  “Is it a lion’s head, Justin? Tell me! Are you knocking with a heavy lion’s head?” My voice was strained to the max, and I felt every cord bulging from my neck.

  Everyone was staring at me, gaping.

  Knock! Knock! Knock!

  “Goddammit, what is that? Are you holding a lion’s head, Justin? For God’s sake, answer me!”

  My Cyclopean eye flashed again, and the picture was all too clear this time. A Bilco door, the fence, the yard …

  A static demon screeched its hellish squalor but not enough to disguise Justin’s disjointed reply.

  “… ess …”

  “Oh my God, Patrick!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, lunging to my feet and slamming the phone down. “Oh my God! Oh my God!”

  “What’s wrong?” someone was asking. People were staring at me, everyone, all of them.