the two levels

by Jonathan R. Miller

  As I think about everything I’ve been through during the past few days, an idea suddenly hits me.

  If the passengers from my plane don’t want me around anymore, and if my momma is gone forever, then why do I need to stay on the second level at all?

  Maybe I don’t.

  Maybe I can leave the second level and find a new place to live.

  At that moment I make a decision.

  I’m going to leave the camping store, go downstairs, and join the retreat on the first floor.

  Why not?

  Energized by my amazing idea, I get ready to leave right away.

  First, I eat all the freeze-dried ice cream.

  Freeze-dried ice cream sounds kind of gross, but it actually tastes pretty good.

  Next, I climb out of my nest behind the counter and venture into the aisles, looking for another backpack to hold all my useful stuff.

  Soon I find exactly what I need.

  The same type of backpack I got the last time I was here with Mr. Emmanuel.

  I fill the backpack with the useful things I gathered:

  My purple keychain flashlight.

  My granola bars.

  My compass.

  My first-aid kit.

  I think about taking Momma’s purse with me, but it’s too heavy. Instead, I open her wallet, pull out an old photo showing her, me, and Daddy, and place it carefully in my back pocket. I put the wallet back where I found it, lift up a corner of the red sleeping bag, and cover the purse again.

  Finally, I put on my new backpack, and then I’m almost ready to leave the second level.

  I kneel down, wrap my arms around the blue sleeping bag, and hold it close to my face for a little while. When I’m ready, I stand up, leave my nest behind, go to the front of the store and crawl out of the broken display window.

  • • •

  I make my way downstairs to the first level.

  The sun is shining through the skylights in the ceiling; as I move through the beams of light, I can see millions of dust motes riding along on the air currents. They swirl around me like a snowstorm as I walk by. I try reaching out to catch them in my hand, but it’s impossible—they always swoop away from my fingers at the last second.

  As I get closer to my destination (the retreat!), I think about the last time I snuck down to the second floor, and how scared I felt at the time.

  I’m scared now, too, of course. But only a little bit—not as bad as I was before.

  And there’s another difference between this time and the last time, too.

  This time I’m also excited.

  I’m excited to see Hadley, excited to have a fun room where I can belong, excited to be around kids who are willing to play with me (as long as they don’t find out where I came from), and excited about the yummy snacks they sometimes serve during the retreat. I’m really not excited about seeing Mr. Jim again, but my not-excitement about Mr. Jim is a lot smaller than my excitement about everything else.

  I keep on exploring, and before too much longer, I catch sight of the door that leads to the Employee Only section. It’s about as far away from me as half a soccer field.

  The door is propped open with a black rubber stopper.

  I duck down behind a round kiosk in the middle of the walkway and watch the door to see if anyone is coming or going.

  Crouched behind the kiosk, peering out every once in a while, I wait.

  No one comes in or out of the door. I don’t hear a single sound.

  After a few minutes, I decide that it’s time for me to go.

  Before I can change my mind, I spring to my feet, run to the door as quietly as I can and slip inside the Employee Only section of the first floor.

  • • •

  The hallway on the other side of the door is completely empty.

  The long, tube-shaped lightbulbs in the ceiling are humming softly, like before—that’s the only sound I hear.

  I move down the hallway on my toes, passing closed doors with strange words written across them; I can sort of read them, but sort of not. I remind myself that this isn’t my first time walking down this hall, but it feels totally unfamiliar—maybe it’s because I’m alone this time. I have no one else to show me where to go.

  Soon I hear voices coming from around the corner up ahead.

  Girl voices. Whispers and quiet laughter.

  I stop walking and turn around, ready to run back the way I came.

  But I freeze. I can’t decide what I should do.

  My mind racing, I try to decide whether to give up, forget this stupid idea, and run back upstairs to the camping store, or whether to stay and see who’s coming around the corner. To see if I can be their friend, whoever they are.

  The voices I hear belong to girls.

  Young girls, like me.

  What if the girls turn out to be nice, like I am? That could be a good thing.

  “Jasmine?” a voice says, making me jump.

  I waited too long to decide—it’s too late now.

  I turn around.

  It’s Hadley. She’s standing at the opposite end of the hallway, but she’s not alone. She’s surrounded by the same five girls she was with before. Every girl, including Hadley, is carrying a cardboard box in her arms, and every girl is wearing a white doctor’s mask down around her neck.

  “Oh, my God,” one of the girls says, staring at me like she just saw a unicorn with wings.

  Hadley shushes the girl.

  “But that’s her,” the girl says.

  “I know it is. It’s okay,” Hadley says. “I’ll talk to her. Just go ahead and finish.”

  The girls don’t move.

  “It’s okay,” Hadley says. “I’ll be there in a second. Just go.”

  After a few seconds, one of the girls—a short girl with long black hair and light brown skin—walks a few steps in my direction, sets her cardboard box down on the tile, and starts fishing around in her front pants pocket, keeping her eyes fixed on me the entire time. After a few seconds she pulls out a jangly set of keys, unlocks a nearby door, and opens it. Within seconds, the other girls hurry through the entryway and disappear into the room on the other side. The black-haired girl quickly picks up her box from the floor and follows them.

  The door closes. The hallway is silent again.

  “Well?” Hadley says, waving me in. “Come on.”

  She doesn’t sound very happy with me right now, for some reason.

  I’m not sure how I messed things up with her.

  I do what Hadley tells me to do; I walk down the hall in her direction.

  As I get closer, Hadley sets her box down on the floor and pulls her white mask up to her face, adjusting the elastic band behind her head.

  “That’s good,” Hadley says. “Stop there.”

  I stop walking.

  I’m standing about as far away from Hadley as the length of our driveway back at home.

  When I imagined seeing my friend again, this isn’t even close to how I imagined it.

  “What are you doing here?” Hadley asks.

  I don’t respond.

  “You’re not even part of all this,” Hadley says. “You lied to us.”

  I did?

  I don’t remember telling a lie, but Hadley seems so angry with me right now that I must have done it.

  “Why are you here?” Hadley repeats.

  “You mean, in the hall?” I ask.

  “No, idiot. On the first floor,” she answers. “Shouldn’t you be upstairs?”

  Oh no.

  I think Hadley might know that I’m really from the second-floor village.

  “I thought it would be okay if I came here,” I say quietly.

  “After being upstairs with all those sick people?” Hadley asks. “You thought you could just be with us?”

  “But I don’t think anybody upstairs is really sick. They don’t seem sick at all.”

  “Well, you’re wrong. At least some of them are sick,” Hadley says.
“And if some of them are, all of them probably are by now.”

  “But I’m not sick,” I say.

  At least, I don’t think I am.

  Am I?

  “You could be,” Hadley shoots back. “And if you are, you could’ve gotten everybody in the whole retreat sick. Even me.”

  I don’t say anything.

  Could I have made other people sick?

  I never thought of that before.

  I don’t think that I’m sick, but I guess I could be.

  And if I am sick, maybe I made other people—healthy people—sick too.

  Like Hadley.

  That would be a terrible thing for me to have done.

  “But how do you even know I was upstairs?” I ask.

  Hadley glares at me over the top of her mask.

  “How do you think?” Hadley asks. “We saw you on TV, standing in the window on the second floor. Did you think nobody would see that? I swear, you’re so stupid—even for a kid.”

  Oh no.

  They saw me on TV.

  “I’m sorry,” I manage to say.

  Hadley shakes her head like I’ve really disappointed her.

  “I didn’t know,” I say.

  “You didn’t know what?”

  “What to do,” I answer. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

  Hadley stares at me.

  “You need to go,” she says.

  “Go where?”

  “Anywhere,” Hadley answers. “Someplace else. If they find you, you’re going to be in a lot of trouble.”

  “But why?”

  “Seriously?” she asks. “Just go. Nobody wants you here. You never should’ve come in the first place.”

  I don’t say anything.

  I think Hadley is right.

  I need to leave here.

  Right now.

  Without another word, I turn around and run back the way I came, toward the door that leads to the main mall area. I have no idea where I’m going to go after that, but I know I need to get away from here as quickly as I can.

  The door is right up ahead. It’s only about as far away as my bedroom is wide.

  “You little fucking bitch,” a man’s voice says from somewhere behind me.

  My stomach drops.

  Without breaking stride, I glance over my shoulder and see Mr. Jim at the far end of the hallway, near where Hadley is standing. He’s wearing a white mask and holding a long black gun in both hands, pointing it at the floor.

  Before I look away, I see Mr. Jim start to run in my direction.

  Chapter Eight

  I sprint through the doorway and into the main mall area.

  I hear the sound of heavy footfalls close behind me.

  You’re not afraid, Jasmine.

  You’re not afraid, Jasmine.

  I run past storefronts, benches, signs, kiosks, and trash bins, searching for somewhere to hide, but everywhere I look seems too obvious. And Mr. Jim is too close for me to do anything without being seen.

  I don’t know where to go or what I should do.

  I just keep running.

  Before long, I see a staircase up ahead. It’s familiar to me—the base of the stairs is blocked with strips of tape stretched across in a criss-crossing pattern. I remember that the tape has Go Back written over and over on the opposite side.

  The staircase isn’t too far away.

  If I can get to the second level, maybe I can find someone who will help me. And if no one will help me, then I’ll hide inside the toy shop, where it’s safe.

  The sound of Mr. Jim’s boots against the tile is getting louder. He’s faster than me. There’s no way I can outrun him for much longer.

  “You’d better run, you sick little shit,” Mr. Jim shouts. “You’d better run.”

  I do what Mr. Jim tells me to do.

  I keep running, and when I reach the base of the stairway, I leap onto the blue metal banister separating the two stairways and swing my legs over the tape, dropping down on the other side, onto the first stair.

  I sprint up the staircase to the first landing. Glancing over my shoulder, I see Mr. Jim screech to a halt in front of the barrier, lean the gun against the banister, and start ripping the tape apart with his hands.

  I don’t wait.

  I run up the stairs and tear off to the left.

  Before long, everything around me starts to look familiar.

  I pass by Chili’s.

  I pass by the bookstore.

  I pass by the jewelry store.

  I pass by the underwear store.

  I pass by the frozen yogurt store.

  Up ahead, I can see the sign for the toy shop. It’s only three stores away.

  I pass by the suit and tie store.

  I pass by the camping store.

  I pass by the shoe store.

  I reach the front of the toy shop, rip open the door, and duck inside.

  • • •

  The overhead lights are turned off.

  I sprint toward the back of the store, toward the cash registers.

  I find my secret hideaway, rip boxes out of the way to make myself an opening, and scramble underneath the train display table.

  My heart hammering, I turn around, reach through the opening, and drag the boxes back into place. When I’m finished I can see a sliver of light shining through a crack between two boxes, but that’s all.

  I hear a noise from the front of the shop.

  It sounds like the glass door just opened and closed.

  I freeze.

  I hear another sound. The sound of heavy boots against the tile.

  Panicked, I peer through the crack.

  I see Mr. Jim walking down the Arts & Crafts aisle, slowly swinging the gun back and forth like he’s hunting a wild animal. His face is red and sweaty, he’s breathing really hard, and his hair looks wet. When he gets to the end of the aisle, he looks to his right, then to his left.

  “I saw you come in here,” Mr. Jim whispers. “You’re so fucked when I find you. You hear me?”

  Mr. Jim approaches the cash registers from the front, leans over, and peers behind the counter, pointing the gun one way, then the other. He grunts as he straightens again. He turns, looks in the direction of the table with the train display on top—the table I’m hiding under—and starts walking toward it.

  “Come on out, Jasmine,” he says. “Everything’s okay.” The tone of his voice sounds like he’s talking to his dog.

  Suddenly I hear the front door to the shop open and close again.

  Mr. Jim immediately whips around, raises the long black gun to his shoulder, and moves quickly toward the front of the store—away from my hiding place—swinging the gun from side to side as he walks.

  “To whoever just joined the party,” Mr. Jim calls out loudly, “consider yourself notified that I am carrying. So unless you like shotguns, I suggest you turn around and go back out the way you came.”

  The shop is silent.

  “Yo, dere,” a different voice calls out. “Because you ask me, I’ll answer. I do like a good shottie, actually. And that’s why I got one of dem in me hands also, my bruh. So whoever the fuck you are, I suggest you slow it down. Change the fucking tone you take with me.”

  I know that voice really well.

  It belongs to Mr. Emmanuel. That’s his tough-guy voice, not his regular one.

  I’m positive that it’s him.

  Mr. Jim freezes, the shotgun pressed against his shoulder.

  “All right, then,” Mr. Jim says. His voice is a lot friendlier than it was a few seconds ago. “Since we both have the means to take one another’s lives, then why don’t we just call this a stalemate. Go our separate ways. What do you say to that?”

  The shop goes silent again.

  “I say skippy to that,” Mr. Emmanuel responds. “And since we agreeable on the point, then it’s time for you to get de fuck back down to the first where you’s from. Do it now and I won’t give you a bellyful o
f shot.”

  “No sir,” Mr. Jim says. “I’m sorry, but I ain’t going nowhere. Not without what I came here for.”

  “And what that be?” Mr. Emmanuel asks. “And you better not say you came to take the little girl. Because you ain’t having her, my bruh. I watch you chase the girl in here, and you done enough to throw a scare into her already. It’s over now. Go on back to your people.”

  Mr. Jim doesn’t respond.

  I watch as he moves slowly toward the front of the shop with the shotgun raised. Soon he turns a corner and I lose sight of him.