Void

by D Haltinner

  “Goodnight.”

  Darren started down the empty hall.

  “Wait,” Audrey called after him.

  Darren turned back to her.

  “I don’t want you to think I’m loose or anything.”

  Darren frowned. What did she mean by that?

  “I just wanted to tell you that I would have let you. If you wanted to.”

  “Let me?”

  Then he understood. His frowned turned into a gape.

  Audrey smiled, a red hue growing across her face. “Maybe next time.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Goodnight Darren.”

  “Goodnight Audrey.”

  Chapter 29

  Darren rolled over in bed, squinting at the sun. Audrey never should have told him that when he left her dorm-just thinking about it kept him up half the night.

  To think, he could have slid the shirt off of her. He could have actually done it with her. It was so early in their relationship, but how could he say no if she was that willing?

  Was she just an easy lay? Did she sleep with every guy who bought her dinner?

  Or did she only say that because she felt Darren was different? She couldn’t love him, not so soon, but did she see something in him that he wasn’t aware of? Did she develop a case of love at first sight?

  It could be a test.

  It isn’t a test.

  What if she’s only laying that card out there to see what’s done with it?

  But she offered.

  Sure, but what if she wants to see some ethics and hear an answer like: ‘I like you a lot, but it’s just too soon.’

  She wouldn’t play a trick like that.

  Wouldn’t she? There’s a lot that’s still unknown about her.

  But she wouldn’t do that.

  Never say never.

  Darren shook the thought from his head. Just deal with it if it comes up again, that’s the best way. Play it by ear. Gauge it off of her mood. Let her make the first move.

  She wouldn’t make the first move.

  Why not?

  She just did, last night.

  What? You mean that revealing shirt?

  No, idiot. She flat out offered herself up.

  Oh.

  Yeah, oh. Bloody idiot.

  Darren rolled back to look at his alarm clock. The alarm hadn’t waken him, and he knew he had set it, but the sun seemed awfully bright for early morning,

  Quarter to seven. He had agreed to meet a Audrey and Jack at seven thirty for breakfast, but looking across the room now, Darren saw Jack wasn’t in his bed or at his computer. His sheets were in a tangled mess, thrown against the wall, and there was something white sticking out of the edge of it, almost like a foil candy wrapper almost.

  Jack doesn’t eat candy though.

  Darren sat himself up with a series of creaks bursting from his joints. He moved his face out of the sun’s path and looked across the room again.

  A condom wrapper? Jack didn’t have a girlfriend. Had to have had some girl in here to use it on while Darren was out with Audrey though. Probably hit it off with one of his coworkers last night and brought her over knowing that Darren was going to be gone. At least she was gone by the time Darren came back.

  He isn’t the only one who could have gotten lucky last night.

  Darren grumbled. “Knock it off,” he said into the room. He pushed himself to his feet and wobbled toward his dresser on the other side of his desk. He dug out his bathroom supplies and when he turned to head toward the bathroom, he saw a note left on the corner of his desk. He walked over to it and read it.

  “Went to go get the tools. Meet you at the hatch we used yesterday at eight.” Short and simple. Darren couldn’t admit to any disappointment that Jack wasn’t going to be at breakfast. In fact, it wouldn’t be such a bad thing if Jack knew nothing about the hatch. Darren and Audrey could do the exploring themselves. No one else would know about their secret.

  Too late for that. Darren needed Jack’s help to find out from his dad about Troy. If it wasn’t for that need, Jack wouldn’t know anything about the tunnel. Darren would have been the only one to know it existed.

  Oh well.

  Darren carried his supplies to the bathroom and got himself ready for the day. He came back and picked out a pair of thick jeans to keep him warm, and a thin T-shirt for flexibility should they find it a bit warmer in spots where his jacket will be too much. He made sure he had his wallet, dropping the phone card out of the fold when he went to slip it into his pocket.

  He forgot to call Troy’s mother again. She should have gotten a story from the school by now. Was seven too early to call? No way to tell, but it was worth the risk of waking people up-he didn’t know them anyways.

  Darren picked up the phone card and carried it to the phone. He dialed the number on the card, put in the number he wrote down, and waited as it rang.

  No one answered. No answering machine either.

  They must know something. Or think they know something. Most parents would be sitting next to the phone all hours of the day if they didn’t know what happened to their kid.

  But what was it they thought they knew? It couldn’t be the truth, that wasn’t possible. Darren was starting to wonder if the faculty even knew what happened to Troy.

  Probably a dead end now. Try calling again tonight or tomorrow, but somehow Darren doubted he was going to get an answer.

  Darren tucked the phone card back into his wallet, shoved it into his pocket, tossed his jacket on, and headed outside.

  The air was just as cold and dry as it was yesterday, sucking what little moisture there was in Darren’s face right out. The sun was brighter then it had been, so there was hope for a bit more warmth when noon came around, but as long as all went to plan, he was going to be underground all day anyways. At least down there, some of the heat from the building might sink through the hatches.

  Wishful thinking.

  Very few people were out at this time, but all of them were headed to the cafeteria. Darren mingled in among the packs and headed to the glass doors of the cafeteria himself, spotting the angelic face of Audrey just inside of the doors.

  “You’re early,” Darren said as he stepped into the warmth of the building.

  “So are you,” Audrey said.

  Darren stepped out of the way of people coming in behind him. “Early bird gets the worm.”

  “I hardly think that applies to breakfast.”

  “If you’re seventy it does.”

  Audrey laughed. “Should we wait here for Jack?”

  “He’s going to meet us at the hatch.”

  “No breakfast?”

  “Guess not.”

  “Well, can’t say I’m sorry not to see him.”

  “Don’t like him?”

  One of Audrey’s cheeks tightened. “He’s kind of bossy.”

  “He isn’t usually like that.”

  “He was yesterday.”

  “He was.”

  Audrey shrugged. “I can tolerate him, heck I can tolerate a lot of people, but let’s just say I have no complaints that he’s not here.”

  “Then let’s use our time wisely.”

  “It’s just breakfast.”

  “But breakfast with you.”

  Audrey smiled and Darren leaned in for a kiss. She tasted like mint.

  Darren took Audrey’s hand and led her into the short line running along the breakfast buffet. They scanned their cards to cover the meal, and carried their trays to the far side of the cafeteria where the windows watched out toward College Street and the administrative building.

  “I don’t know why Jack would want to miss out on such wonderful eggs,” Audrey said as she prodded the scrambled mounds with her fork.

  “They seem rather dry to me,” Darren said, trying a large piece.

  “I think I’ll stick to the hash browns.”

  “Might not be a bad idea.”

  Audrey picked at the oil covered potatoes, a
nd stuck a piece in her mouth. “Why didn’t Jack want to come to breakfast?”

  “He left a note saying that he went to get the tools we’ll need.”

  “Boys and their toys.”

  “He seems to want to get through that door pretty bad.”

  “It’s probably just an old storage area.”

  “Locked?”

  “What else would be down there?”

  Darren shrugged. “So far, nothing has made sense.”

  “You are right about that one.”

  “We’ll find some answers today.”

  “You better be right, because there’s something unnatural about that place, and it just feels like we’re late.”

  “Late? What do you mean?”

  “It feels like we’re behind schedule. Like if we were on our way to the movie theatre and the movie had already started according to the clock on the dashboard.”

  “Why would it feel like that?”

  “I don’t know, but that’s kind of how it feels,” Audrey said. “I feel rushed.”

  “Well, I doubt the tunnel’s going to go anywhere on its own.”

  “That’s not exactly it.”

  “You just feel like we’re late with whatever we’re doing down there?”

  “Pretty much, yeah.”

  “We’ll just have to hurry up then.”

  “I just hope we’re not too late.”

  “We’ll catch up.”

  “To what?”

  “To whatever it is, we’ll catch up.”

  “I sure hope so.”

  Chapter 30

  Darren and Audrey made their way across the library, trying to look as nonchalant as possible. The library opens at seven thirty on the weekends, but there wasn’t a soul in the building besides the squirrely haired librarian at the front desk. Her entire attention was given to the computer screen in front of her, but Darren still felt like they were sticking out like a bear among beetles.

  “I’m not so sure this is a good idea right now,” Darren said when they were a safe enough distance from the librarian

  “Why?” Audrey asked, unzipping her jacket.

  “There’s no one here. If we vanish this morning, the librarian will notice.”

  Audrey shrugged. “More people will come soon. I don’t think it’s a big risk.”

  “If you think so.”

  They weaved through the bookcases in case the librarian was noting which direction they moved, and turned toward the boiler room. When they hit the last row of bookcases and stepped out from around it, they saw Jack standing against the wall, backpack around his shoulders and weighted down by the tools he had ventured to get.

  “Why are you standing out here?” Darren asked.

  Jack grabbed the handle of the boiler room door and pushed on it. “Someone took my cardboard out of the lock.”

  “Shit,” Darren said. “They know what we’ve been doing now!”

  “The maintenance guy probably has no idea why the cardboard was there.”

  “There’s nothing in there except the hatch!” Darren ran a hand through his hair and looked up and down along the wall. “They probably have someone watching us now.”

  “I think you’re overreacting,” Audrey said.

  “They just about caught us red-handed!”

  “No one caught us,” Jack said. “And no one’s trying to catch us. Just think about it for a second before you jump to conclusions.”

  “Think about what?”

  “Okay, Friday, end of the day, right?”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “So, the maintenance man checks the boiler pressure just before he leaves for the weekend."

  “Yeah, probably.”

  “He finds the door latched plugged up. He has two options then. Either call the campus police about the security breach and spend hours with them doing reports and trying to figure out why someone would want to get into the boiler room, or take the cardboard out, make sure everything is still there, and leave and go home to the little wifey.”

  Darren frowned.

  “If you were the maintenance man, which option would you choose? Especially knowing that only a few people only had a key to even get in here to plug the latch up.”

  “I’d take it off and go home,” Darren said. “You really think that’s what he’d do though?”

  “I would,” Jack said.

  “I’m sure I would’ve too,” Audrey said. “Why make more work for yourself at the end of the day when you know there’s nothing in there someone would want anyways?”

  “I guess,” Darren said.

  “I don’t think anyone knows it was us, or what we were doing in there,” Jack said. “They probably figured the librarian was getting on with a student in there and just closed it back up.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Darren said. “But what do we do now? We can’t pull up the hatch underneath the bookcase if all three of us go down there, no one will be there to close it back up.”

  “We can go break into Rosch Hall and cut open the hatch you two found,” Jack said. “Or one of us can go down the hatch under the bookcase and open up the boiler room door again like I did the first time. I’m up for either option.”

  “I don’t want to add another breaking and entering charge,” Darren said. “So I guess we’ll take the second option.”

  “Good choice,” Jack said. “Let’s get moving.”

  Jack led the way toward the first hatch, Audrey and Darren holding hands behind him. Audrey leaned and whispered into Darren’s ear. “See now how bossy he gets?"

  Darren nodded. He did see it, and he didn’t like it. It was almost the attitude of a druggy getting anxious for his fix. Darren didn’t doubt that Jack would have actually broken into Rosch Hall if that had been the only option.

  Jack got to the bookcase first, and without even a glance to be sure no one was looking, he hefted the bookcase and started to drag it to the other side. Darren let go of Audrey’s hand and took hold of the other side to help drag it across the carpet. Once it was moved, Jack lifted the hatch, shrugged his backpack off, took out one of the Barney flashlights, and then lowered the backpack into the hole by its strap, dropping it only when he had to.

  “I’ll meet you at the boiler room door,” Jack said as he positioned himself over the shaft.

  “You better,” Darren said.

  “Just close it up after me, and I’ll be waiting for you,” Jack said. He pushed off and dropped into the hole before anyone else could speak.

  Darren moved to the edge of the hatch and looked down. Jack was on his feet, picking up his backpack, Barney already pointing down the tunnel.

  Darren shut the hatch.

  “Come on,” he said to Audrey. “Let’s get this moved back in place before the librarian goes wandering around.”

  Audrey took one end of the bookcase and helped Darren wrestle it back over the hatch. She kicked at the carpet to remove the impressions made by the bookcase, then reached for Darren’s hand.

  Darren took it, and walked with her back toward the boiler room.

  “I wish he didn’t have to come with us,” she said as they walked.

  “I know,” Darren said.

  “Why can’t we go without him?” she said. “Why does he have to come?”

  “He does have the tools.”

  “Yeah, but we could have gotten them ourselves.”

  “Well, we’re stuck with him today.”

  “What about tomorrow?”

  “You already think we’ll be coming back again?”

  Audrey shrugged.

  “I hope we don’t have to spend all day down there,” Darren said. “I hoped we’d be in and out in a few hours after we found out what was behind that door.”

  “What about the other tunnel we didn’t turn down?”

  “What about it?”

  “Don’t you think we should go exploring down there too?”

  “I just thought we’d find our answers and call it a day.
”

  “I’m not so sure we’re going to find that many answers.”

  “I guess we’ll just have to play it by ear.”

  “Just promise me one thing.”

  Darren looked over to her. “What?”

  “No matter what,” she said. “Don’t leave me.”

  “I won’t, I never would.”

  “Do you promise?”

  “Yes, of course I promise.”

  Audrey reached up and met Darren for a kiss.

  “Why would you think I’d do that? Leave you?” Darren asked as they reached the boiler room and stood in front of it.

  “I don’t think you intentionally would,” Audrey said. “I’m just afraid that you might walk away from me because you got distracted, and I don’t want to be left alone down there.”

  “I promise, I won’t leave you.”

  A loud bang echoed from the other side of the door. It wasn’t loud enough to be heard by anyone out of view, but it was still louder than Darren liked to hear.

  Audrey gripped Darren’s hand, squeezing it tight.

  The door inched open, then flew the rest of the way, revealing Jack standing in the dark boiler room. “Come on,” he said over the hum of the boilers.

  Audrey slipped into the room, and after a quick glance, Darren followed her in. He shut the door and found the light switch that Jack had the flashlight in his hand pointed at.

  The room looked just as it did the previous day and carried the same mugginess that reminded Darren of a sauna. It wasn’t as hot in there as a real sauna, but the air was just as thick.

  “Here,” Jack said, pulling out the other two flashlights and handing them out. “I brought extra batteries for them all just in case.”

  “What else did you bring?” Audrey asked.

  Jack set his backpack on the floor in front of her and pulled it wide open. “The cordless sawzall and an extra battery, a hammer, chisel, couple of screw drivers, and a vise grip.”

  “You really think we’ll need all of that?” Darren asked.

  “I hope not, but it’s better to be safe than sorry.”

  “Guess so.”

  “There’s also a box of crackers and a couple of bottles of water at the bottom,” Jack said. “Just in case.”

  “Were you a boy scout?” Audrey asked.