The Girl Who Lived Twice

by Tina Clough

  Thomas had to ring the office. He had left very abruptly and not told anyone where he was going. He found he could not face the complication of telling the receptionist what had happened, so said only that there was a family emergency and he would let them know when he would be back. The receptionist was ready to commiserate, but he cut her short and said he had to rush and would call back later.

  He put the phone back in his pocket and smiled ruefully at John. “I keep promising to call people to tell them things – I hope I remember them all. How do you think they knew about the tyres and how to trick her? Do you think someone at the garage is involved?”

  “Could be anything, but of course we’ll check if there’s a link at the garage. But people talk, you know, about this and that to all and sundry. Often it’s coincidental - one person hears two facts from two sources, realises they relate to the same story and that the facts mesh, so they put two and two together – sounds unlikely, but you’d be surprised how often luck or chance comes into these things. Mind you, I’m prepared to bet that our journalist friend hasn’t been able to resist gossiping all over town.”

  His mobile rang and his face registered satisfaction at what he heard. He smiled at Thomas. “Well that’s good, they’ll have the cell location for us shortly. Meanwhile we’ll organise a rescue party and get the armed offenders squad on stand-by.”

  Thomas’s imagination instantly ran through a stream of horror images – a shootout in a concrete building, bullet bouncing of steel beams, bullets penetrating the plastic tank. His hackles rose. “You’re not serious! You can’t go in shooting before you know where Mia is, what if she gets hit?”

  “No, we’ll make sure everyone knows about the tank, and we won’t have any shots fired into the building before we know where the tank is, but we have to be prepared. Don’t worry, these guys know what they’re doing, but criminals who plan to rob the casino are definitely going to be armed, so we have to be able to meet threat with equal threat.”

  Thomas understood the logic, but he did not share John’s confident view that everyone would do the right thing in a situation that might turn messy. “Let’s hope you are right!” was all he said, but in his head he was shouting “No!”

  CHAPTER 19

  Mia lay on the floor of the tank with her eyes shut. It felt more natural that way – looking at total darkness with open eyes was depressing and disorientating. She had spent some time trying to remember if she had ever heard what the minimum amount of water was that you could survive on. She knew that she could survive for weeks without food, but water was more urgent. She turned the torch on for a moment and checked the water bottle which was full but not very big; probably only about one third of a litre. As soon as she knew how little water she had her thirst increased a hundredfold and her mouth suddenly felt dry. It took a major effort of will to stop thinking of drinking some of the water and put the bottle down.

  Panic was standing right behind her breathing down her neck, waiting to jump if her grip slipped. I’ll try yoga to calm myself. Not that I know the first thing about yoga, but I’ll probably feel better if I can slow down my heart beat and relax.

  She arranged her arms down beside the length of her body with the outer edges of her hands resting on the floor. Probably the trick would be to see that no part of her body supported any other part. She would try to let everything just rest on the floor and started with her shoulders, making sure they were as flat on the floor as they could be and worked down her body, trying to consciously relax her muscles and become a dead weight. She realised that she was not exhaling properly, too keen to snatch the next lungful of air and breathing in a shallow way, so she made herself push the used air out of her lungs and slowly inhaling a new deep breath. After a few minutes she noticed that she was not aware of her body – she could not think of her arm and feel it. It was as if her mind was disassociated from her body. Well done, she told herself, I feel much calmer now. Being able to make something happen gave her a sensation of being in control.

  After what seemed like an hour she opened her eyes and to her surprise saw two dark grey circles above her. That must be holes through the roof of the tank and now that my eyes have adjusted to the dark I can see that they’re partly open – not that they’re any use to me. I can’t climb up there and they are far too small to be useful. But at least I know I have lots of air and maybe if I shout the sound will carry.

  She sat up and did some stretches and then raised herself to her feet and wiggled her ankle. It was still swollen and sore and she could still only hobble. She lay down again and closed her eyes and wondered what else she could tell Thomas and John to help them find her. Gradually the urge to go to the toilet increased until it could no longer be ignored. She sat up and turned the torch on and looked round. There were no holes in the floor at all.

  The pie segments moulded into the floor created five completely separate depressions; she would have to decide which one was to be the toilet. She poured a few drops of precious water from her bottle in the segment opposite the hatch to see which way the floor sloped and watched it run towards the outer wall. That’s it then, this is where I pee. At least it will collect as far away from me as possible, and maybe there’s enough air coming in to make it bearable. She was whispering to herself and gained comfort from hearing her words; it was nearly like having company. I’ll take my trousers and knickers right off and just stand with my feet wide apart, because I can’t bear to think of crouching on this ankle – I’d probably fall over. Please god, let’s hope I can avoid having to do anything apart from peeing – that would be really nasty.

  She felt a lot better once she was back at home base and dressed again. Every little practical thing she did, even just deciding that one segment was home base had contributed to a feeling of having control over her existence. Maybe that’s what happens to people, she whispered in the dark. Maybe they lose the ability to resist or have hope, if they feel they have no control over their fate. Perhaps it makes them unable to try things. I must keep myself going and be strong. So everything I do, every silly little thing, even checking which way my pee would run has made me feel stronger so it must be a good thing. She had one sip of water to celebrate the idea that she could empower herself. The tank was cool and she was not perspiring - the water would last for a while. She forced her mind to drop the subject.

  It was frustrating to have nothing to tell the outside world. If only she had seen a little more from the van she might have got some specific points of reference. But once inside this building she had seen nothing that helped. Her mind started wandering off again down its sloping path of fear and despondency.

  I’m sure they won’t ever let me out. What bad luck that battery was just starting to charge. I wonder how long it will last if I only turn it on for a minute every now and then? What if John maybe needs me to stay ‘on line’ so to speak, so they can plot where I am? I don’t even know if that’s how they do it with cell phone networks, but I’m not going to waste the battery unless he tells me to. I’ll check for new messages in a couple of hours. But I told them not to call or text me, so they’d only do it if it was vital.

  She lay down flat on the floor again. There was very little she could do apart from try to relax or think - and somehow she had run out of thoughts, apart from very frightening ones, which were better pushed to the back of her mind. She knew that if she let go she would see images of herself screaming and sobbing, starving to death or more likely thirsting to death, hallucinating and losing control, clawing at the hatch. And once she had let that demon out of the bottle she might never be able to push it back in. Better to invent silly games to keep her mind safely busy.

  She lay in the dark with her eyes shut and tried to compose a mental crossword on a grid of 8 x 8 squares, but failed after four words. She reduced the grid to 6 x 6 and thought she got it finished, but it was hard to check. Next she tried to list as many states in the US as she could remember and thought she got to thirty-ei
ght before she lost track.

  And then suddenly acute panic swamped her mind. There was no warning. The calm she had achieved with her relaxation session evaporated instantly. She knew that if she could not take some sort of constructive action she would either scream or cry. Her calmer self was clutching a thin strand of reason, holding on for dear life, breathing fast and feeling it slip between her fingers. She scrambled to her feet, turned the torch on and looked round.

  Two segments to her left was the hole in the wall that was the start of the big pipe she had sat on before she got into the tank. She went over to inspect it. Shining the torch into it she only saw discolouration and some grit – the torchlight bounced off the inside of the pipe at the right-angle turn. She knelt down and checked to make absolutely sure that she would not be able to wriggle through, but she could only fit her head and one shoulder inside and that bend would be impossible to negotiate. There were no visible ways of undoing the pipe from inside. She could visualise the squat metal supports it rested on as it traversed the floor of the factory – there was no way it could be dislodged by one person inside the tank.

  She stood up and supported herself against the side of the tank, making her way back to home base. A sudden thought made her stop and shine the torch directly at the hatch door. She studied it intently. Those curved metal rods shaped like the letter ‘c’ fitted into channels round the door – that’s what locks the door into place when the wheel on the outside is turned. Her whole body went hot with excitement. How does it work? My god, maybe I can open it from inside! They would never have designed it to prevent people getting out, so maybe it can be undone from inside.

  She looked closely at the mechanism and traced it with her fingers. Behind this metal plate in the centre is the screw thing, which the outside wheel turns. Imagine I’m standing outside to open it – I would turn it anti-clockwise, so from this side that’s the opposite way, clockwise. If the central disc moves clockwise this rod pulls along here and that bit there does the same. That means that both these curved attachments that fit right into this channel round the door would retract. That’s how it works! You turn the wheel and those rods push the long curved things into the channel round the opening and hold the door shut. I should be able to open it by rotating the thing clockwise.

  She bent down, put the torch on the floor and grabbed the rods and tried to force them clockwise. They did not budge. There was not the slightest movement. She let go and considered the thing again. Where would she be able to exert the most effective force – as close to the central plate as possible or out by the rim? If it worked like a lever, then the end seemed the best bet, but this was not a straightforward lever action so perhaps taking hold closer to the centre would be more effective. She tried to imagine what it would look like. There must be something that happened when the wheel was turned that allowed the curved pieces to come out of the channel. Oh, I think I know, she whispered. They are sort of hinged somehow under that round plate in the middle, so you only turn the wheel perhaps a quarter turn or less, and they actually fold underneath the central plate and pull back and that makes them a bit shorter, and that pulls the curved things out of the channel!

  She stuck her fingers under the edge of the round plate and carefully tried to feel what was there. The plate was quite thick and had raised areas on the back – it felt a bit like the raised partitions on the floor of the tank. Perhaps it makes things stronger? She felt the rods and their connection. I’m right, that’s how it works. Full of elation and renewed energy she grabbed hold of the rods again and again and strained as hard as she could, but still nothing happened. Her hands ached and there was no indication that anything was loosening.

  Mia straightened up and pushed her hair back from her sweaty forehead and took another sip of water. She picked up the torch and tried to look sideways behind the plate, but she saw nothing that gave her any clues. She lay down on the floor again and turned the torch off. In her mind she played a film clip of someone standing outside turning the wheel and herself standing inside watching it. And suddenly she knew what to try. She turned the torch on and jumped to her feet with no thought for her injured ankle and nearly fell over when the pain hit her. She put the torch on the floor and propped it up with the water bottle, so the beam of light was aimed straight at the door. She gripped the disk itself with both hands as hard as she could and tried to rotate it clockwise. Her hands slipped and something under the plate ripped her right forefinger. She pulled her hand out and wiped the blood on her pants and tried again. She had never exerted such pressure on anything in her life; she was holding her breath and her heart was pounding - she grunted with effort. And then she felt it move – a tiny move, but definitely movement.

  She let go and lowered herself to the floor and rested. She was panting, her hands ached and her forefinger was bleeding steadily. She wiped the blood on her trousers again and then used her left hand to put pressure on the ripped skin. She held on hard for a couple of minutes, while her breathing slowed and the sweat dried on her face and neck. Another sip of water and back to work – she stood up again and got a grip on the plate and put her entire strength into trying to turn it. This time the plate rotated easily and a metallic click told her it had gone as far as it was meant to. The curved pieces had come right out of the circular channel and when she pulled on the door it swung silently inwards.

  She poked her head out and peered cautiously round. The big space was empty, the light was fading and the big doors were shut. Fish had said they were padlocked from outside, but she had to check if she could get out that way. The most important objective was to get out of the building, far more important than calling for help. The men could return at any time and the thought of being found outside the tank in the locked building made her shudder – they might tie her up before locking her in the tank again, or simply kill her. She grabbed her things and sat straddling the hatch edge while she lowered first the bottle and then the torch to the concrete floor. She held on to the phone and clambered out. First things first, don’t rush it Mia, she whispered to herself. She reached in and swung the door closed and spun the wheel to lock it in place. The shoes would stay by the hatch, so it looked as if she was still inside.

  There was nothing that could be used as a walking stick, but along the wall by the doors she saw some untidy piles. It’s stuff they left when they abandoned this place. It might be useful. I’ll go and have a look. She picked up the torch and limped slowly across the dirty floor towards the door.

  The doors were securely locked and no shaking or pushing would help – it felt as if there might be a bar across them on the outside. Next she turned her attention to the pile of rubbish – bent and broken bits of pipe, pieces of iron, a square metal container that was empty. The best choice was a thin metal pipe about a meter and a half long - everything else was too long or too heavy. She picked it up and it worked well. I look like one of those shepherds in picture books, the ones with long staffs. But it works and I can move a bit faster. Too much noise, though – I need to muffle it a bit. Every time it hits the concrete floor it sounds like a nail gun going off. If the men return they’ll hear it and know that I’m out of the tank, before I’m aware of them.

  She removed her slightly tattered knee-high stockings and managed to fashion a fairly thick pad for the end of her pipe. She tied it on as tight as possible and tried it – very little noise. Well done again Mia, she said to herself. The light was going fast and soon it would be dark inside. The only windows were right up at the top of the walls - and the building was a vast darkening expanse stretching into the distance behind the tank. Huge steel pillars stood like trees, supporting the structure of the roof. There were man-high partitions here and there, and a lot of debris. She saw the footprints of long gone pieces of machinery and in places the floor was studded with treacherous bolts embedded in the concrete.

  Mia progressed slowly down the length of the building, watching the floor and trying not to stub her toes
and stopping every few steps to listen for sounds of traffic or movement outside. The gloom was deepening and she peered at both walls, checking for doors. She found two normal size doors, but both were locked and solid. At what had looked like the end of the building there was a walled off block of offices and toilets, locker rooms and a staff room with a water boiler on the wall. Here the windows were at normal height and barred. She tried to open one in the hope of being able to attract attention by shouting, but the clasp was corroded and would not budge. She smashed the glass with her staff and stood for a few minutes shouting as loudly as she could.

  In one of the offices she found a wooden stool which she dragged over to the smashed window and managed to clamber up on it to get a better look outside. It was nearly dark now and all she could see was a concreted yard with some sheds and piles of debris, surrounded by a tall wire mesh fence. There was nothing outside the fence that looked inhabited, just some corrugated metal buildings and an overgrown field and the remains of a burnt-out bonfire. At intervals she shouted and banged with her metal staff on the bars across the window, but there was no response.

  Mia had been so engrossed in her efforts that she had forgotten to call Thomas while she was certain that she was alone and nobody could hear her. Once back on the open factory floor, where she could look down the length of the building, she knew she would hear it if anyone opened the big doors at the end. She had just turned her phone on when a distant scraping noise alerted her. Quickly she pressed the off button and held the phone against her chest to hide the light from the screen. She stood completely still, listening intently. It was now very dark and the tank blocked her direct line of sight to the big doors at the far end, but she thought she could make out indirect light from the far side of the tank. Someone must have entered and left a vehicle outside, perhaps with parking lights turned on. She inched to one side, making sure the staff didn’t make any noise and leant against the wall, waiting and listening.