“I think so,” he said. He slumped back against the bed.
“Nausea? Room spinning?” she asked sympathetically.
“Terrible,” he said.
She put a hand on his shoulder. “Come on, we need to get out of here.” She stood and held out a hand to help him up; he took it, standing gingerly, the effects of whatever it had been were almost completely gone. He looked around the room, his vision clear.
“What exactly were you doing?” Charlie asked, and Carlton froze. Her voice was too hard, too … polished. He turned to her, keeping his face neutral.
“He didn’t say? John thought you might want to have it, your old experiment. I think he wanted to surprise you with it,” he said. He grinned. “Surprise!”
Charlie smiled.
“You know, your old experiment?” Carlton’s mind raced. “The one with the robotic hand that could play the piano?” he added. “You remember?”
“Right. How sweet of you to come get it,” she said, a flirtatious note in her voice, and Carlton’s blood went cold. He nodded carefully.
“You know me. Always thinking of others,” he said, glancing over Charlie’s shoulder at the bedroom door behind her. It was closed. She took a step closer to him, and he stepped back instinctively. She looked surprised for a moment, then grinned, looking down and seeing the two faces in the box. He moved back again, startling when he hit the wall behind him.
“Carlton, if I didn’t know better I’d think you were afraid of me,” Charlie said in a low voice, stepping so close there was almost no space between them, pinning him to the wall. She reached out toward his face, and he set his jaw, trying not to flinch. She ran her fingers down his cheek, then traced the line of his jaw. He didn’t move, his breathing shallow. Charlie brushed his hair out of his face and pressed closer to him, trailing her hand to the back of his neck. Her face was inches from his.
“Um, Charlie, you’re not really my type, you know?” he managed to say.
She smiled. “You haven’t even given me a chance. Are you sure?” she whispered.
“Yeah, I’m sure. I mean don’t get me wrong, you’re okay-looking, but let’s be honest, you’re nothing to write home about,” he quipped, maintaining eye contact. “I mean, those boots with that skirt?”
Charlie’s grin started to wane.
“Sorry, that was rude. I’m sure you’ll find a guy someday who appreciates you for who you are.” He tried to inch his way toward the door. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m late for quartet practice, so let me just get by you and I’ll be on my way.”
Carlton squirmed but Charlie didn’t budge. “I promise I won’t tell anyone that I rejected you. Just hit that gym and we can try again in a few years.”
“Carlton, you’re obviously flustered. There’s only one way to really be sure how you feel,” Charlie said softly. She leaned closer, and Carlton screwed his eyes shut. The earpiece. It was in his right pocket.
“Charlie, you’re right, but maybe we should just talk for a while, you know. I rushed into my last relationship and I almost ended up dead in a moldy fur suit.” Just distract her until … his fingers closed on the earpiece, and he pulled it from his pocket, opening his eyes at the same time.
Carlton screamed.
Charlie’s face was splitting apart. Her skin had taken on a plastic cast, it was cracked at the middle, splintering into triangular sections. As he watched, her hand tightening around his neck, the triangles lifted up and pulled back like razor-edged flower petals, revealing an entirely different face, sleek and feminine, but definitely not human. The petals of what had been Charlie’s face began to move along the round perimeter of the new face, beginning to look more like a saw blade than a flower. The animatronic girl pursed her metal lips, leaning in for a kiss as the blades spun closer and closer to Carlton’s face. In a final burst of self-preservation, he yanked the earpiece out of his pocket and jammed it into his ear, flipping the switch.
The animatronic girl drew back at once, letting go of Carlton’s neck with a surprised look on her metal face. She glanced around the room. He stared at her, frozen in terror for a moment, then he realized what was happening. She can’t see me. He waited, watching as she took deliberate steps backward, her eyes darting back and forth. She stood for a moment, the plates of her face snapping back together to form the painted, glossy face of a doll, then suddenly a ripple of light passed over her and she appeared to be Charlie again, her face expressionless. After another minute, she turned and went to the bedroom closet. She peered in, pushing clothes out of it as if something might be hidden behind them, then stepped away. She went to the bed and grabbed a corner, then lifted it off the ground. She considered the empty floor for a second, then let the bed drop with a crash. Once more she scanned the room, and at last, she opened the door to the bedroom and let herself out. Carlton tiptoed behind her, following her into the hall. She stopped short in front of the hall closet, and he almost bumped into her, barely catching himself before they collided.
The animatronic girl ripped the boxes from the neatly stacked closet, tossing them haphazardly on the ground behind her. Carlton cautiously stepped back a few feet.
When the girl was satisfied the closet was unoccupied, she checked the bathroom, then walked out into the living room. With one last, dissatisfied glance around, the animatronic girl left Jessica’s apartment, closing the door calmly behind her. Carlton rushed to the window, watching as she exited the building and walked away down the road, heading toward the town.
Once she was out of sight, Carlton heaved a sigh, gasping as if he had been holding his breath. He felt dizzy again, light-headed, but this time it was only fading adrenaline. He started to take the earpiece out, then thought better of it and left it in place. He patted his left pocket, reassuring himself that the second earpiece was still there, and he hurried out of the apartment and down to his car. He drove away urgently, heading toward John’s house without regard for the speed limit, and hoping the animatronic girl was going the other direction.
* * *
Charlie heard the door close, and she turned toward it. The room was dark except for the light filtering in through the small, dirty window, and she squinted to see who had just come in.
“John?” she whispered.
“Yeah,” he said in the same tone. “Did I wake you up?”
“It’s okay, all I do lately is sleep, and dream.” The last word was bitter on her tongue, and he must have heard it, too, because he sat down on the chair Marla had placed beside the bed.
“Is it okay if I sit?” he asked nervously, already there.
“Yes,” she said. Charlie closed her eyes. The room was different now. Safer. “You said something,” she murmured, almost to herself, and John leaned closer.
“Did I? What did I say?” He cleared his throat, his palms already sweating.
“You said … you loved me,” she whispered, and he jolted as if someone had struck him.
“Yes,” he said, his voice sounding choked-off. “That is what I said to you. You remember that?” Charlie nodded carefully, knowing her response was inadequate. He turned away from her for a second, letting out a forced breath. “It’s true. I do!” he said in a rush, turning back to her. “I mean, you’ve been my friend since forever. Just like Marla or Carlton or Jessica. I would have said that to any of them. Well, maybe not Jessica. So, you remember some of that night, then?” he asked briskly.
“It’s all I remember. And the door. John!” She grasped his arm, alarmed. “John, the door was opening, I think Sammy was inside—I could feel him there, his heartbeat …” She trailed off as another memory overwhelmed her, a moment in the strange, artificial cave under the restaurant that was so like Freddy’s, and yet so unlike it. “Springtrap,” she said. “I fought with him. There was a metal spike, and his head …” She could see him, gasping on the rocks as she ground the piece of metal torturously into his wound.
“I know; I saw it, too,” John said, an uncomfort
able shift in his eyes.
“He said, ‘I didn’t take him. I took you.’”
“What?” John gave her a puzzled look, and she sighed in frustration.
“Sammy! I asked him why, why he took my brother from me, and that was what he said. ‘I took you.’”
“Well, you’re here now. He’s insane, anyway.” John attempted a smile. “He probably just said it to hurt you, to confuse you.”
“Well, it worked.” She let her head sink back onto the pillow. “John, everyone’s avoiding the question: How long has it been? I know it’s been more than days, but how bad is it? A month?”
He didn’t answer.
“Two months?” she ventured. “I know it can’t be more than a year or you’d have a nicer apartment,” she said weakly, and he winced. “John, tell me,” Charlie insisted, hearing her own voice rising, her heart beating faster as she waited for him to speak.
“Six months,” he said at last. She didn’t move. She could hear the blood rushing in her ears.
“Where have I been?” she asked, her voice barely audible over the rushing sound.
“Your aunt Jen, you were with her, at least I think that’s where you were.”
“You think?”
“I’ll tell you everything, Charlie, I promise—as soon as I understand it myself. There are things I just don’t know,” he finished helplessly. She lay back, staring up at the ceiling. In the dim light, the stains looked like they could be decorative.
“About your aunt,” John went on, something awful in his voice. “I saw her that night.”
Charlie looked sharply at him. “That night?”
“The building was coming down; you were inside, and I was trying to get to you, and she was just suddenly there— I don’t know how she got in, or why.”
“It was her house, technically,” Charlie said, turning back to the ceiling. “Maybe she was there looking for me.”
“And that makes sense to you?”
“I don’t know what makes sense,” she said steadily. “It doesn’t make sense what I remember and what I don’t remember. There’s no one moment where suddenly it all goes blank. But I don’t remember Aunt Jen being there.”
“Okay,” he said.
“I have to see her,” Charlie said with sudden intensity. “She’s the only one who knows how all of the pieces fit; she’s the one with all the secrets. She’s always tried to protect me from them, but now … secrets aren’t protecting anyone.”
She stopped: John looked stricken, his face stuck between expressions like he was afraid to move it. “John?” Charlie said, a knot forming in her stomach. John took a breath as if to speak, then hesitated; she could see he was searching for words. She gave them to him. “She’s dead, isn’t she?” Charlie said faintly. She felt like she was drifting off again, but she was not losing consciousness. John nodded.
“I’m sorry, Charlie,” he said hoarsely. “I couldn’t stop it.”
Charlie looked back up at the stains. I should feel something, she thought. “You need your head clear,” she whispered, echoing her aunt’s habitual reminder.
“What?” John was watching her anxiously.
“Paperwork,” she said more loudly. “She kept files on everything, locked up in cabinets. Whatever she knew, she wrote it down, or someone else did. Where was she?”
“A house, in Silver Reef, the ghost town,” John stammered; he looked taken aback. “There were files there, boxes of papers.”
“Then we have to go back there,” Charlie said firmly. John looked as if he wanted to protest, but he just nodded.
“She might go back there, too, if she thinks you’ll be there.” John shared a worried look.
“We have to go.”
“Then we go there,” he said. Charlie closed her eyes, the decision releasing her into sleepiness. The door opened, and dimly, Charlie heard Marla and John whispering to each other. She took a deep breath, like she was going underwater, and let herself slip into the dark.
Hey!” Something poked Jessica’s shoulder, and she shrugged it away and rolled over, still half-asleep. “Hey, you okay?” Something poked her cheek, much harder, and she opened her eyes and looked up to see a ring of children surrounding her, staring with wide eyes. Jessica screamed.
Someone grabbed her from behind, covering her mouth, and she struggled to get away.
“You have to be quiet,” a desperate voice whispered, and she turned to face a red-haired girl of about seven, looking at her anxiously. “If you’re not quiet, it’ll come get you,” she explained.
Jessica sat up carefully and put a hand on her head; it felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and her sinuses were burning. “Not again.” Chloroform, or whatever that gas was.
“What?” the girl asked.
“Nothing,” Jessica said, looking at the frightened faces that surrounded her. There were four children in all, two boys and two girls: There was the young redheaded girl with freckles on her nose, and a stocky, African American boy of about the same age, who looked like he had been crying before she arrived. He was sitting cross-legged with a young Latina girl of three or four on his lap, hiding her face in his shirt. Her fine brown hair had all but come loose from two long braids down her back, each capped with a pink ribbon, and the matching pink shorts and T-shirt she wore were stained and filthy. The last little boy, a skinny blond kindergartener with a massive bruise on his forearm, hung back a little from the rest, his hair hanging over his face. They were all looking at her like they expected her to do something.
“What is this disgusting place?” Jessica wiped her hands on her shirt and shook out her hair as though it might be full of spiders. She stopped in midshake, and turned to the kids as though seeing them again for the first time. Her mouth hung open slightly.
“You’re the kids.” She gasped. “I mean, you’re the kids, the ones that were taken, and you’re alive!” She suddenly remembered the mother at the hospital. We have to find that kid and bring him home, Jessica had insisted to John, the words sounding hollow even to her own ears. Now the kids were standing right in front of her. It’s not too late to save you, she thought, filling her with new purpose. She looked at the little blond boy. “Are you Jacob?” she asked, her heart fluttering, and his eyes widened in response.
“Hey, it’s going to be okay,” she said, trying to believe her own words. “I’m Jessica.” None of them answered her right away, instead glancing at one another, trying to reach some silent consensus. Leaving them to it, Jessica stood, surveying their surroundings.
It was a dank, brick-walled room with a very low ceiling, so low that Jessica couldn’t fully stand upright. The room had exposed pipes all along the walls, some of them giving off plumes of steam. There was a large tank in one corner, probably a hot-water heater, and in the far corner was a door. Jessica went to it.
“Don’t!” the redheaded girl squealed.
“It’s okay,” Jessica said, trying to make her tone soothing. “I’m going to get us all out of here. Let’s just see if it’s locked,” she said, hearing her own voice ring out cheerful and hearty. She sounded patronizing; it was a tone she’d always despised in adults when she was a child. “I’ll just check,” she said more normally. She walked briskly toward the door.
“No!” three voices cried. Jessica hesitated, then grasped the knob firmly and gave it a twist. Nothing happened. Behind her, one of the children let out a sigh of relief.
“It’s okay,” Jessica said, turning back to them. “There’s always another way out.” She scanned their anxious, grimy faces. “What happened here?” she asked. The boy with the child on his lap looked at her suspiciously.
“Why should we tell you anything? You could be one of them.”
“I’m in here, same as you,” Jessica pointed out. She dropped down to sit beside him, putting herself on the children’s eye level. “My name is Jessica.”
“Ron,” he said. The little girl on his lap tapped his shoulder, and he bent down as she
whispered something in his ear. “Her name’s Lisa,” he added.
“Alanna,” the redhead said, a little too loudly. The blond boy didn’t say anything. Jessica eyed him, but did not ask.
“Hi, Ron, Lisa, Alanna, and, Jacob,” Jessica said with excruciating patience. “Can you tell me what happened?”
“She ate me in her tummy,” Lisa whispered. Instantly, Jessica felt the blood rush from her face.
“You mean the clown girl?” Jessica asked softly. “The robot girl?” The children nodded in unison.
“I was in the woods,” Alanna said. She held her hand against her stomach, then mimed the clamp shooting out. “Chomp!” she said, her face deadly serious.
“I was riding my bike by my house,” Ron said. “There was a woman in the road—she came out of nowhere, and I fell off the bike, I was trying not to hit her.” He gestured to his knees, and Jessica noticed for the first time that they were scabbed over. He’s been here long enough for those to heal, she thought, but held her tongue, afraid if she interrupted he would stop talking altogether. “When I got up, she was standing over me,” Ron continued. “I thought she was trying to help. I told her I was okay, and she smiled, and then …” He glanced down at the girl on his lap for a moment, then went on. “I swear, honest, her stomach split right open, and there was this big metal thing that came out of it, and—” He shook his head. “She’s not going to believe us.”
“Did the thing grab you and pull you inside?” Jessica asked softly, and he looked up at her in surprise.
“Yeah,” he said. “Did she get you, too?” he asked.
“No, but I’ve seen it happen,” she said half-truthfully. “Then what?”
“I don’t know. Next thing I remember I woke up in here.”
“What about her?” Jessica gestured to the girl on his lap. He shrugged, looking briefly embarrassed.
“As soon as she woke up, she climbed onto my lap.”
“Do you know her?”
“You mean from before?” He looked down at the little girl again.
“No, none of us knew one another before,” Alanna said. Jessica looked at the little blond boy, and he looked away.
The Fourth Closet Page 16