by Obert Skye
See? We all have things to do.
Well, Tobias had been doing something. He had gotten to the library, gotten away from Orrin, and found a secret space behind the walls. The space was thin and dark, but Tobias could stand and walk. He held his hand out in front and shuffled his feet forward to feel for anything that might stop or harm him. The passageway seemed to go only in one direction. After a bend, it ran for a long distance and then bent again. Tobias tried to remember each shuffle and step so he could record it. Just past the second bend, it came to a stop. He pushed a latch and was surprised to step out through one of the tall storage lockers near the corner of Weary Hall. Tobias had hoped the passage might lead him outside, but it seemed to just be a connection between an old locker and an unused library.
He closed the locker, noted its number, and made it back to his room without incident. It was past ten, and he was wrestling with himself over going to sleep or trying to make an escape now. Sleep sounded wonderful, but freedom sounded better. He probably would have gone with sleeping if it had not been for what he had overheard Orrin say: “Tomorrow we will begin this semester’s extractions.”
Tobias didn’t know what Orrin meant, but he had no desire to be extracted.
Inside his room he quickly took out his papers and added the details of the library and hidden passage to his map. He scribbled the word Gothiks. Something about the way Orrin had said it made it feel important. After returning the paper to its spot under the floorboard, he walked over to Charlotte. She was in a dead sleep, making him feel almost bad about what he was about to do—almost.
The time had come to inflict a little pain and see if he could get his sister’s mind back.
Kneeling next to her bed, he reached out and put one hand on her right shoulder and his other hand over her mouth. Tobias took a deep breath and began to shake her.
Charlotte’s brown eyes flashed open, and she tried to scream.
“Quiet,” Tobias whispered. “You need to be quiet.”
“Mffrllllfruup,” she said from beneath his hand.
“If I take it off, you have to be quiet,” Tobias insisted.
Charlotte nodded, and Tobias removed his hand.
“I was sleeping!”
“I know,” Tobias replied. “That’s why I woke you. You have to get up—we’re leaving.”
Charlotte tried to close her eyes, but Tobias wouldn’t stand for it.
“Listen to me. Do you want to just keep doing this forever? Reciting things for hours, doing dishes, and sleeping—that’s not a life.”
“It’s fine, and I like the sleeping part,” Charlotte insisted.
“This isn’t sleeping,” Tobias argued. “We don’t even have pillows. You’re just so exhausted you don’t care.”
“Okay,” Charlotte slurred.
“I didn’t want to do this, but it worked for me.”
“You don’t want to do—”
Tobias grabbed a tiny bit of the back of Charlotte’s upper arm and pinched, while twisting it as hard as he possibly could. It was a move Charlotte herself used to use on him whenever they fought. Now he was doing it in hopes of shocking her back into reality. He tried to remember all the times his sister had been mean to him in hopes of making himself feel better about hurting her.
He put his other hand over Charlotte’s mouth as she screamed. She sat up and swung her legs over the edge of the cot. When her feet hit the floor, Tobias lifted his right leg and slammed his foot down as hard as he could on her toes. He placed both his hands over her mouth as she drew in breath to scream even louder.
“Shhhh,” Tobias begged. “You have to keep quiet.”
Charlotte sobbed and bit at Tobias’s hands, but he kept them in place and smothered her screams. It took a minute or two, but she finally began to calm down.
“I’m sorry,” Tobias whispered, listening for anyone who might have heard the muffled commotion. “I had no choice.”
After a few minutes, Charlotte was still. Tobias asked her once more if she would keep quiet, and she nodded. He slowly removed his hands. She shook her head as if she’d just been swimming and needed to shake the water out of her ears.
“Why’d you do that?” Charlotte whimpered, rubbing her arm.
“Sorry,” Tobias replied. “I really am, but I need you to think straight.”
“I was thinking straight,” she protested, still shaking her head. “Who do you think tried to talk you out of that dumb idea?”
“What dumb idea?” Tobias asked.
“To go up to the second floor and…” Charlotte stopped and looked around, confused. “Wait a second, what day is it?”
Tobias smiled—his pinching and slamming seemed to have worked.
“I’m not sure. I think it’s Friday. They don’t have clocks or calendars around here, but I’ve been making marks under the cot.”
Charlotte continued to rub the back of her arm. She reached out and pinched Tobias. “I should smash your toes.”
“I’m so glad that worked,” he said happily. “So do you remember now?”
“Sort of. We were in the gardens,” Charlotte said softly. “And they stopped us, right?”
Tobias nodded.
“We jumped out a window,” she said as memories cleared in her mind. “And you stole some pliers.”
“And pens,” Tobias added. “Then they made us talk to Marvin Withers, and he gummed up our brains.”
“In a square room,” she said almost reverently.
Tobias nodded.
“I think I was mad at you,” Charlotte said. “Really mad.”
“You forgave me,” Tobias lied.
“I don’t remember that part. But I do remember the gardens and Lars and … wait! Was there some sort of parade?”
“Kinda. You loved it.”
“Everything’s coming back. Orrin, Ms. Gulp…” Charlotte paused and looked at Tobias. “Dad left us, didn’t he?”
“He did.” Tobias nodded.
“And Mom’s dead,” she said in a whisper.
Tobias ached for all the sadness he had been through, but he ached even more for what it had done to his sister.
“I need to sleep,” Charlotte said sadly. “I want to wake up somewhere more hopeful.”
“If you want to wake up somewhere more hopeful, then we need to move. They’re planning something, an extraction, and if they find out our minds are clear, they’ll take us back to old man Withers and dumb us up again with his voice. The only hope we have is to escape NOW!”
Tobias stood and reached for his sister. She breathed in deeply and then took his hand.
“We’ll visit Fiddle first.”
“Really? He thinks we’re made up,” Charlotte reminded him.
“Fiddle knows something, and at this hour he should be in his room. He said there was a door that could lead us off the mesa. I think I can get us out of the building, and if he knows where to go from there, then it should be easy.”
“Easy?”
“Well, less than impossible.” Tobias smiled.
“Plus, I have a surprise for you.”
“It’s not another pinch, is it?”
Tobias retrieved something from beneath one of the cots.
“My clothes!” Charlotte said with excitement.
He handed Charlotte the clothes she had been wearing when she came to Witherwood.
“When they gave us uniforms, we just left these in the washroom. And since nobody but us ever goes in there, I hid them in one of the showers.”
Charlotte practically squealed. “Turn around and close your eyes.”
She changed into her clothes and then kept her eyes shut as Tobias changed into his. They tossed their uniforms with gusto into the corner of their room. It made things seem much more hopeful—Tobias in his red hoodie and Charlotte in her green HOPE shirt.
“Feel better?” Tobias asked.
“Worlds. Let’s do this.”
Tobias and Charlotte stood at the door and listene
d for voices. They traveled up the hall to Fiddle’s door. Tobias unlocked it.
“What if Fiddle shoots us for sneaking in?”
“At least we won’t have to do dishes tomorrow.”
That was good enough for Charlotte. Once they were both in the room, Tobias closed the door and turned on the light. The curtains were closed around Fiddle’s bed, and they could hear an uneasy sniffling.
“Fiddle?” Tobias said softly. “Fiddle, are you in there?”
There was no reply.
“It’s me, Tobias, and my sister, Charlotte.”
There was still no reply.
“We were here last week, remember?” Tobias tried.
“Maybe that’s not him in there,” Charlotte whispered.
“It is. I can smell him.”
Tobias stepped carefully toward the bed and pulled back the curtains. Fiddle was lying there with his head resting on his duck-printed pillows. He was wearing a long black nightshirt over shorts and pinching the top of his nose. He smiled at Tobias with his wide mouth.
“Hello, imagination,” Fiddle said kindly. “You’re back. I guess the lock on my door isn’t working?”
“I made a key,” Tobias explained.
Fiddle sat up and swung his legs so that they were hanging off the side of the bed. His green eyes sparkled, and his long dark hair appeared even stringier than before. There was a tray of empty plates and glasses at the end of his bed. He pushed the tray back and yawned.
“I like that,” he said. “I’ve got a pretty interesting imagination.”
“You didn’t make us up,” Charlotte insisted.
“I think it’s cool how you both have different voices,” Fiddle said. “Lots of times my thoughts all sound the same.”
“I guess that’s cool,” Tobias said, pulling at the back of his own hair.
“Actually, I need your help. Would you do me a favor and get me a pen?” Fiddle asked. He pointed at a large chest of drawers near the wall. “Top drawer and hurry, please.”
Tobias stepped to the dresser and opened the top drawer. It was filled with ballpoint pens of all colors and sizes. Tobias took a couple and put them in his pocket. He then grabbed a blue one and brought it back. Instantly Fiddle began to click the top of the pen.
Click, click, click.
“Are you going to write something down?” Charlotte asked.
“No,” Fiddle said, knitting his eyebrows together. “I’m always surprised how many of the things inside my head are unaware of my problem.”
“Problem?” Tobias asked.
“I can’t seem to stop fiddling with things,” Fiddle said, clicking the pen. “Some doctors call me obsessive compulsive. It’s kinda like how you’re messing with your hair.”
Tobias was immediately embarrassed.
“Not a big deal,” Fiddle said in a friendly tone. “You tug your hair, I fiddle with things. That’s why they call me what they do—my real name’s Clyde.”
“I like Fiddle better,” Charlotte said.
“Yeah, me too,” Fiddle said as he rapidly clicked the top of the pen. “Hey, maybe subconsciously that’s why I still do it, just to keep the name. Interesting, I think we’ve had a real breakthrough here tonight. Of course you two should know more about the condition of my mind, seeing how you came from my thoughts.”
Click, click, click.
“We came through the door,” Charlotte reminded him.
“Fiddle,” Tobias said seriously, “we need to talk about something else.”
Fiddle closed his eyes and massaged his forehead with his left hand.
After thirty seconds of awkward silence, Tobias asked, “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Fiddle answered. “I was just seeing if I could tell what you were going to say by looking around in my head. Something about the parade?”
“No, although you did a good job sitting on that float.”
“Thanks. Actually, they make me participate. My uncle used to sit up there, but he stopped doing that years ago.”
“That’s great,” Tobias said, frustrated. “What I wanted to talk about is when we were last here, you said you knew something about getting off the mesa.”
“I did?” Fiddle asked, confused.
“This is going to end badly,” Charlotte sighed.
“No, wait.” Tobias turned his focus back to Fiddle. “Listen, Fiddle, you said something right before Ms. Gulp took us out—something about a way to get out, something about a door.”
“To be honest, I can’t remember half the things I say,” Fiddle admitted. “But if you really want to get out, just take the tunnel. It has a door on it.”
“Tunnel?” Tobias and Charlotte asked in unison.
“Sure,” Fiddle said. “It’ll take you right down and off the mesa.”
“Where is it?” Tobias asked, his heart beginning to race.
“Behind the school. Over by that tree.”
“What tree?”
“The one with the crooked branch. Out back behind Witherwood, where the mesa starts to slope downward. Near the spring. It’s the tree where that squirrel used to live.”
Click, click, click.
“Please,” Charlotte begged. “Do you think you could stop clicking that pen?”
“Forget the pen,” Tobias said. “Can you take us to the tunnel?”
“I don’t go out much,” he reminded them. “Plus, my uncle told me to stay here.”
“Marvin?” Tobias asked.
“Yeah, that’s him.”
“When did he say that?”
“A couple of years ago,” Fiddle answered.
Click, click, click.
“Here,” Charlotte said anxiously as she pulled an elastic ponytail holder from her skirt pocket. “Can you mess with this instead of that pen? Twist it and pull it, but just stop clicking.”
Fiddle looked at the small black band and shrugged. He dropped the pen and immediately began twisting and stretching Charlotte’s hair tie.
“Do you ever listen to the voices in your head?” Tobias asked.
“Sometimes,” Fiddle admitted.
“Well, this voice is telling you to take us to that tunnel,” Tobias said.
“We can’t get out of the building,” Fiddle reminded them. “They chain the outer doors at night.”
“I think I know a way.”
Fiddle smiled. “I forgot about my great imagination. It looks like I’ve thought of everything.”
“Yes,” Charlotte said. “You’ve been a tremendous help.”
“I really have,” Fiddle agreed.
The hallway was empty, and there were no singing voices. The three of them crept quietly in the direction of the kitchen. While creeping, Fiddle asked if they were helping him or if he was helping them. Charlotte laughed in the way that someone might laugh when she discovers she has gotten a flat tire or lost some money, more out of frustration than humor.
“There’s no way this is going to work,” she said.
Fiddle looked down at her and smiled. “You’re like the negative part of my imagination.”
Charlotte wanted to reply, but the only things she could think to say were negative. Tobias spoke for her.
“She’s just reminding us that it’s going to take a bit of luck to make this work.”
“Well then, I’ll wish for a bit of luck. I like adventure, even though I know my uncle wouldn’t approve of this.”
“Good,” Tobias said. “That probably means we’re on the right course.”
They walked down the hall toward the kitchen as they proceeded on the right or, quite possibly, the wrong course.
CHAPTER 20
THE SQUIRREL TREE
Witherwood seemed guarded and afraid. It felt as if the walls were coiling in tighter to protect whatever it was the school was hiding.
“Tell me if you hear anything,” Tobias said to Charlotte.
“It’s raining outside.”
“I can smell that.”
“I
t sounds like the hall is empty for the moment,” she added. “I can hear voices singing, but they seem to be in the other halls and growing distant.”
“Good. As long as they believe we’re still under the spell of Marvin’s voice, they won’t expect us to escape.”
Fiddle kept his head down and moved with a catlike stealth as he followed Tobias and Charlotte. They passed the large double doors that led out behind the school. As expected, the doors were secured with chains.
“Are you doing okay?” Tobias whispered to Fiddle.
“Silly imagination. You know I am. I’m actually having a way better time than I thought I would tonight.”
They walked through Weary Hall and turned into Never Hall, where the cathedral-like cafeteria was. The lights were off. The place was empty and still.
“Come on,” Tobias said.
He led Charlotte and Fiddle to the kitchen and down into the cellar. Tobias grabbed a small flashlight that Ms. Gulp used when she was down there. They followed the large pipes that ran to the back of the cellar and up out of Witherwood. Where the pipes exited the building was a set of stone stairs that looked as if they led directly into the ceiling. Only it wasn’t the ceiling. It was two metal doors that were used for deliveries. The sound of rain falling against the doors was almost calming; the sight of a chain twisting through the door handles was not. A padlock dangled from the chain like some sort of metallic mistletoe that people were supposed to cry under.
Tobias didn’t cry—he swore. As far as swear words go, it wasn’t the worst one in the world, but it had bite to it. “I was hoping they didn’t padlock these doors. I thought they’d forget the cellar. It’s never chained in the day.”
“This was your escape plan?” Charlotte asked. “You know that they secure all the doors at night. They’re trying to keep us in, remember?”
“Technically, that’s not true,” Fiddle said. “They’re trying to keep things out.”