14

by Peter Clines

  Something came rushing up the hall, over Clive’s shoulder, and hit Tim in the side of the head. It felt like metal and he got a quick glimpse of silver spinning past him. He looked down and saw Mrs. Knight’s cane whirling past Nate and Xela. It vanished into the darkness of space.

  Roger had managed to move a yard or two away from the door. Now he ran forward and lunged at Clive. The winds pulled at him but his momentum carried him across the hungry maw of 14’s doorway. He slid along the floor, spun on his hip, and grabbed Clive’s legs in a bear hug. Past them Tim saw Debbie and Mrs. Knight trying to resist the pull of the wind. Debbie threw herself against the wall and wrapped her arms around her husband’s shoulders.

  A sheet billowed out of Clive and Debbie’s apartment. It thrashed in the hallway for an instant, like an angry ghost, and was sucked away.

  Tim looked into Clive’s eyes. The other man nodded. Then Tim took a deep breath and let himself slip past the door frame.

  * * *

  Nate looked back at the door and the wind whipped at his eyes. The wooden frame hung in space, like the mystery door at the start of the Twilight Zone. He could see the hallway through it, see Veek braced against the brutal wind. And if he looked past the frame he could see flecks of light and a sparkle of interstellar dust.

  Nate’s fingers slid on the knob. He made them into hooks on the glass ball. It didn’t help. Things flew by too fast to see what they were. A few papers plastered themselves on his shoulders before leaping free and diving toward the stars.

  Xela had thrashed and tried to climb his legs for a few moments. Now she squeezed his calves together so hard his legs ached. The wind pulled at her and tried to drag her off into space. He shot a glance down and saw her face pressed against his legs. She was almost silhouetted against the twin stars below her but he was sure her eyes and mouth were shut tight.

  He saw flecks of ice on her eyebrows and lips. Frost formed in her blue hair. His toes were getting numb.

  It’s cold in space, he thought. Even just a few feet into space.

  He looked back up at the doorway and saw a pair of legs hanging down. A dark-soled sneaker was just above the doorknob. It was too far for him to reach. He saw Veek through the rectangle of light and her mouth moved in a scream. A moment later her eyeglasses flew by.

  Something long and silver whizzed by him and the legs dropped about a foot. Then they came a few more inches. The sneakers brushed his elbow.

  Someone flew past the doorway up above. It might’ve been Roger.

  Nate took the deepest breath he could as the air rushed past him. He looked down at Xela. “Hang on!”

  He counted to three and flung his hands from the doorknob to the legs. He got his arms wrapped around them but slid down the pant leg. Xela shrieked and her nails bit into his calves.

  Whoever was hanging through the doorway flexed his feet up to make a hook. Nate’s arms caught on it and the slide jerked to a halt. Xela screamed again. She was crying. He looked down and ice sparkled around her eyes.

  Something whacked him in the shoulder hard enough to make his collarbone ache. He glimpsed a steel padlock as it plunged into outer space. Nate looked up and saw three more hanging from the waist the legs were attached to.

  He had a moment of wondering if they were expected to climb and then they were dragged toward the door. Tim’s legs went up a few inches, then a few inches more. The older man bent at the waist, folding around the door frame. Nate realized he was above the knob, alongside the door. He turned his head and saw the number 14 sitting sideways next to his face.

  He heard a distant crash, a shriek, and more things flew past him. Bigger things. He caught a flash of red and a flutter of papers and something whacked his hip. They missed Xela and flew off into space.

  Tim trembled and lurched up again. Nate felt Xela slip. He tried to bend his feet up the same way Tim had, but they were so numb he couldn’t tell if they moved.

  He looked down. Xela’s head was swaying. She looked dizzy. “Hold on!” he shouted to her.

  Hands reached through the doorway and grabbed him under the shoulders. They pulled him up and he was in the hallway. His perspective swung around and he was sideways. “She’s slipping,” he yelled. “Grab her!”

  Tim rolled over on the floor. The older man reached in—down—through the door. Nate fell to the ground on top of Clive. Roger twisted free and lunged after Tim to grab Xela. They dragged her out of the doorway.

  Someone slid next to Nate and wrapped her arms around him. “Oh, thank God,” cried Veek in his ear. She squeezed him tight. Either she was very warm or Nate was much colder than he realized.

  He hugged her back, then leaned forward. “Tim,” he shouted. “We have to close it!”

  Tim nodded and waved for Clive to grab his legs. Roger was still holding Xela. She wasn’t moving. He was rubbing her arms and hands, trying to warm her.

  Tim lowered himself into the doorway head first. He reached down and his fingers closed on the knob. He flexed his back and tried to heave the door closed.

  A trio of shapes bounced down the hall from the lounge. The couch cushions spun across the hardwood before leaping into the air and diving through the doorway. One of them whacked Tim in the arm as it passed him.

  Tim heaved again and managed to get the door a few more inches up. He stretched across the hinged side of the door. The higher he went, the harder it was to keep his body out across the doorway. Clive was across Tim’s legs, his feet braced across the hall. Debbie had Tim’s ankles.

  Nate gestured for Veek to join him and they threw themselves across the doorway. For a moment deep space pulled at him and then Nate landed on the edge of the door, right by the four empty hasps for the padlocks. Veek wrapped her arms around his waist and he stretched his fingers out for the knob. The winds roared and tried to push him back into space. He looked in—down—and saw the spinning cushions and a distant flash of red beyond them. There was a cloud of debris falling out of the Kavach Building and into the twin stars.

  Tim heaved and his fingers brushed Nate’s. He heaved again and their hands clasped together on the knob. Nate stretched and grabbed the edge of the door. He tried to lift but with the air pounding against it the wooden panel weighed a ton.

  Roger was next to him. He reached down and grabbed Nate’s wrists. “Don’t let go!” he bellowed.

  Nate nodded and Roger pulled. His muscles swelled and his veins pulsed under his skin. He let out a bellow of his own and the door rose another foot. It was a handful of inches away from being closed. The wind screamed through the gap.

  Tim and Roger exchanged looks across the gulf. Tim let go of the knob. Roger’s hands jumped from Nate’s wrists to grab the ball of cut glass. He turned his head to Nate and shouted “Get clear!”

  Nate let go and Veek dragged him away. The air shrieked as it made a last rush through the narrow opening. Roger worked one knee up against the door frame, took in a breath, and roared. He threw his weight back and the door slammed shut.

  The latch caught with a sharp click.

  The wind vanished. A few papers drifted to the floor. Silence boomed out along the length of the hallway.

  Roger collapsed. The hallway tipped and shuddered, and Nate realized he’d fallen over and slid down the wall. Veek slumped against him.

  Xela crawled over and fell onto Roger’s lap with a smile. Her nose was bleeding. She patted his thigh.

  “What the hell?” said Clive. He was holding Debbie and rocking her back and forth. Her eyes were wide and wet. “What the HELL JUST HAPPENED?”

  Nate held up a hand to quiet him. “Everybody okay?” he called out. His throat was raw.

  Veek nodded. Xela gave a tired thumbs up. Roger closed his eyes and stroked her hair. “Think we’re good, bro,” he said.

  Clive looked up and gave a quiet nod.

  Tim staggered to his feet and gave the door a tentative poke. Then he banged it with his fist. It echoed and trembled like a wooden door. He sla
pped the four hasps down into place and fished a padlock off his belt. The lock snapped shut on the hasp and Tim pulled the next one from his hip. He stopped and looked around the hall. “Wait,” he said. “Where’s Mrs. Knight?”

  Veek leaned her head out away from Nate. “Did she duck into the stairwell?”

  “Mrs. Knight?” called Nate.

  “She slipped,” whispered Debbie.

  Clive looked down at his wife. She was crying. “What happened, hon? Where’d she go?”

  Debbie raised her eyes. “I couldn’t let go,” she said. “It was dragging you all and she slipped and fell and I...I couldn’t let go of you. I couldn’t grab her.”

  Her eyes drifted away from his and settled on the door to apartment 14.

  a flash of red

  “Oh, no,” murmured Tim.

  “I’m so sorry,” Debbie cried. “I’m so sorry.”

  Fifty Seven

  They heard a low rumble and Roger braced himself against the wall. They all gave each other looks. A second peal of thunder came from outside.

  Clive looked from Nate to the door and back. “Should we open it back up? Maybe...maybe we can find her?”

  Nate remembered the distant cloud of debris and shook his head.

  Tim crouched by Debbie and took her hand. “Debbie,” he said, “there’s nothing you could’ve done.”

  She sniffed and her eyes flicked up to focus on him.

  “We barely got Nate and Xela out. You were doing everything you could to help save them. If you hadn’t, we would’ve lost them. And probably me.” He set his hand down on her shoulder. “And maybe Clive, too.”

  Her arms tightened around her husband.

  “What happened is awful, but we all have to stay calm for now, okay? Right now we need you to go into your apartment and see how much damage the wind caused. Check all the walls. Can you do that for us?”

  Debbie sniffled and nodded.

  “Good.”

  Clive helped her up and she shuffled across the hall. She vanished into their apartment and he stood watch at the door.

  Tim looked at Nate. “What now?”

  Nate gazed at the tenants slumped in the hall. His eyes fell on 14 again. “I’m not sure. How long was...how long did all that take?”

  Veek pulled her phone out. “It’s time for Xela to get started.”

  Nate blinked. “That was ten minutes?”

  “Not even,” said Tim, “but I think we all collapsed for a couple minutes once you were out and it was closed again.”

  Nate glanced over at Xela, who wiped blood from her nose. “You need to paint the door.”

  “What?”

  “The door,” he said. “You still need to paint over it and hide the seams.”

  “I...” She looked at the door. “I think the paint’s on the other side of the galaxy with Mrs...with my brushes.”

  “Do you have more?”

  “I do but they’re good ones. I can’t use them for—”

  “You have to,” he told her. His fingers cramped and he bit back a grunt. “Go get your other brushes, Roger will dig up some more paint for you down in the cellar.” He looked at the other man and got a nod in return.

  “My knife’s gone, too,” added Xela.

  “You can have one of mine,” said Clive from the doorway. “I’ve got two.”

  Roger helped Xela up. She hobbled on one shoe for a moment before kicking it off. The two of them shuffled down the hall toward the lounge and the back stairwell. “Wow,” she called to them. “We made a mess of the place.”

  Clive glanced between Nate and Tim. “What are we going to do about... about her?” He tipped his head at the door to apartment 14.

  “I don’t know,” said Nate. He pressed his fingers together and forced them straight. “We’ve got to take care of all of us first. Then we’ll figure that out.” Another crash of thunder rattled the building. “All your windows are gone?”

  He glanced over his shoulder. “Yeah. There’s glass everywhere.”

  “Blame it on this storm. Tell Oskar as soon as he gets back. That way he won’t question it if you don’t have your story straight.” He pointed down the hall at the shattered front window. “We’ll blame all of this on the storm. It’s all broken inward so he shouldn’t question it.”

  In their apartment Debbie lifted up a shredded quilt and started crying again. Clive went in to hold her. She broke down in his arms.

  Tim snapped the last padlock into place. The bottom one was missing. Nate reached up to rub his shoulder where it had hit him. It crossed his mind that said padlock was now in deep space, headed into a star that wasn’t the sun.

  So is Mrs. Knight.

  “We need another padlock,” he said. “We’ll have to pull one from somewhere.”

  “The cellar storeroom?” said Veek.

  Tim shook his head. “Too visible. Everyone’s down there at least once a week for laundry.”

  “The roof then,” she said. “You could do your publishing-magic on one of the locks up there.”

  Nate nodded. “Go to the roof,” he said. “Get one of the locks from the door, one that looks the most like the one we lost.”

  Tim nodded and headed for the staircase. He passed Xela coming back down with a collection of brushes. She’d washed the blood from her face and some of her swagger had come back. He paused to give her a quick hug and she squeezed him back.

  “You should get cleaned up, too, boss,” she told Nate as she got closer. “You’ve got a horror movie thing going on right now.”

  Nate dabbed under his nose. His upper lip was sticky. So was his chin and the corner of his jaw under his ears.

  “Go wash up,” Veek told him. “We’ll get everything under control here.”

  Roger appeared up the back stairwell with a can of paint. It was coated with drips and small spills, but it moved like it still had some liquid in it.

  “Okay,” said Nate. “Everyone remember to talk to Oskar if you need to.”

  * * *

  They had a perfect excuse to meet later in the lounge. Oskar found his own windows cracked and brought in the maintenance team for an emergency call. Men were all over the building, screwing sheets of plywood over the window frames.

  Debbie had recovered, but Clive kept a reassuring arm around her. He’d changed his bloody, shredded shirt for a tee. Xela wore a heavy sweatshirt and a pair of Uggs. She wrapped Roger’s arms around her as well. Veek had a pair of backup glasses with thick frames. Nate thought about making a Velma comment, but decided against it.

  His hands still ached. His forehead had needed a Band-Aid and his shoulder had needed three. He’d been grateful to find an old pair of wool socks at the bottom of one of his drawers for his frozen feet.

  Tim had the flatscreen on. Every channel was covering the freak thunderstorm which had formed over Los Angeles. One showed footage of planes making emergency landings at LAX. The Channel 7 meteorologist, Dallas Raines, explained how a storm of such magnitude could appear out of nowhere. He used computer models to show two high pressure fronts colliding to form a low pressure zone.

  “It was supposed to be clear tonight,” said Xela. “Clear for the rest of the week.”

  “I think we did this,” said Tim. He pointed up at the screen and circled the glowing green rendering of the storm. “This low pressure zone...we made it.”

  Roger frowned at the television. “How?”

  “What do you think all that wind was?” asked Veek. “We just funneled something like a few tons of the atmosphere off into deep space.”

  “Among other things,” muttered Clive.

  Tim mimicked the weatherman’s gestures on the screen. “Air rushes in to fill that gap,” he said, “high pressure hits low pressure area, and wham. Thunderstorms in July.”

  “We should call the police,” said Debbie.

  They turned to look at her.

  “We need to tell them...tell someone about Mrs. Knight,” she said. Her eyes were
open and alert.

  Roger shifted behind Xela. He shot a glance at Veek, who traded it with Tim. Clive saw it over his wife’s shoulder.

  Nate leaned forward on the couch. “I don’t think we can tell anyone,” he said quietly.

  Her eyes opened a little more. “Why not?”

  Tim reached over and took her hand, just like he had once they’d closed 14’s door. “What would we tell them?”

  “That she’s dead.”

  “And when they ask how she died?” murmured Veek. “What then?”

  “We’d tell them the...” Debbie stumbled over the words. She took in a breath to start again and let it slip out.

  “You see the position we’re in,” said Tim. “If we tell the truth the police’ll think we’re lying. If we make something up, they might sense the lie from one of us. Either way, they’ll assume we’re involved in her disappearance.”

  “We are involved.”

  “He means...actively involved,” said Nate. “Don’t you?”

  Tim nodded. “We’d all be suspects. When she never turns up, some of us might even get taken into custody.”

  “We could show them,” she said. “We could open the door again.”

  “Spectacularly bad idea,” said Roger with a shake of his head. “And I’ve heard some shitty ideas, believe me.”

  “Assuming Oskar even let them open it,” said Nate. “He can just say he’s the only one with keys to the locks. Heck, we made sure it looks like the door hasn’t been disturbed in decades.”

  Xela had run out of paint and pronounced the door done just a few minutes after Tim snapped the replacement lock into place. It wasn’t perfect. Nate could see the wrinkles of torn latex beneath the fresh coat, but Veek pointed out any irregularity could get written off as damage from the storm.

  Tim let go of Debbie’s hand and stood up. He looked at Nate. “May I offer a suggestion?”

  “Please.”

  The older man straightened up. “No one say anything. Don’t say anything about Mrs. Knight to anyone.”