Number One-Part 3

Not surprisingly, nothing in the room had changed. She slid down the pole to a sitting position. She had seen the nail in the bathroom. Maybe that would work. If she could pry it out she might be able to get herself out of the handcuffs. She’d never picked a lock before, but there was a first time for everything, right? And it wasn’t like she had other pressing things to do. She’d just have to work at it until she got them open. And hope they didn’t kill her first. Or do whatever it was they were planning to do with her. And she could think of a lot worse things than death. She tried to out that possibility out of her mind. There wasn’t much she could really do to stop them short of escaping, so there was no point in dwelling on it. Freaking herself out even more wasn’t going to save her. Maybe she should yell for help. If they were indeed in a residential area, someone might hear her.
“Help!” she screamed as loud as she thought she could. “Anyone! Help! I’m in the basement! Someone help!” There was a flurry of footsteps and she heard the door open quickly behind her.
“I was wondering when you were gonna try that,” came the voice of the chubby man. She turned her head as he walked around her and squatted down to her eye level. “It ain’t gonna work. There’s no one around for miles that’s gonna hear you. Plus,” he pulled a small handgun out of the waistband of his pants, “I’ve got this. And I really don’t like the racket. So keep it down.” He stuffed the gun back into his waistband and left.
Trapped in the basement of a crazy person with a gun. The future just kept looking more and more bleak. No one around for miles. That meant that they were probably out in the country. Great. Far from civilization. Wouldn’t it be fantastic if this were all a dream? Then she could wake up, look around and see only her darkened bedroom and heave a huge sigh of relief. As much as Melanie wanted to believe that was true, she knew it wasn’t. This felt too real to be a dream. While she could remember having some pretty vivid dreams, none of them had come close to this. And her mind wasn’t screwed up enough to come up with this, even if she had eaten a huge bowl of curry on her last break at work. No, this was real. The concrete floor, the handcuffs digging irritatingly into her wrists. All real.
The reason for her being here still nagged at the back of her mind. She had to have done something. Anything to either of these guys for them to have gone to all the trouble of getting her here. And now she had seen the second guy, Chubby, so she had another face to try and remember. She wracked her brain. She had to have seen him somewhere. But as hard as she tried, she came up with nothing. Even picturing him without the stubble didn’t help. The thing was, he had one of those faces that just blended in. She thought he looked familiar, but couldn’t place him. Likely because there were a lot of people in the world who looked like him. The same floppy cheeks and double chin. Chubby didn’t seem to have a lot of characteristics that would distinguish him in a crowd. But nonetheless, she kept thinking.

She was deep into her memory, trying to reconstruct the past few weeks in her mind when they checked on her again. So deep, in fact, that she jumped a little when the door opened suddenly. It was Blue Eyes, and, just as before, he came in, checked her handcuffs with a shake, and left. Not a word was spoken.
Mel began to wonder how long it would take before she was missed. She lived alone, so there was no roommate around to start asking questions when she didn’t get home from work. And she wasn’t friendly with any of her neighbors, so none of them would even know if she was missing for weeks. And even then they’d probably just think she’d gone on vacation. She didn’t really have a lot of close friends, either. Well, close physically anyways. She had close friends, they just lived in different area codes. And she hated the phone, so they didn’t really talk much, it was more email and text-messaging.
A slow feeling of dread began to creep over her. No one would notice that she was missing. Well, someone would notice if she didn’t show up for work in 4 days, but that was 4 days from now! Between now and then there was no reason for anyone to be looking for her. She had no appointments, no classes, nothing. She talked to her mother on the phone every now and then, but they didn’t have any kind of regular calling schedule. If her mother called and didn’t get a call back for a few days, she’d just assume Mel was working and would call her back when she had a day off.
A lot could happen in those 4 days. In those 4 days, she could be dead. Or worse. She silently cursed herself for being such a hermit. If only she’d made a few friends at work, or taken some kind of classes when she’d moved into the city. Something, anything where someone would wonder why she was missing enough to actually look for her.
She hadn’t wanted to be a hermit. She wasn’t exceptionally shy or stand-offish. It just took her a while to get to know people. She’d only been in the city for a year. Which would be plenty of time for anyone else, she thought. Even if she had gone on a date or two. A boyfriend would notice if she was missing. A boyfriend would wonder where she was enough to start looking for her, get worried she wasn’t answering the phone. But no one had even shown the remotest interest in her. Not that she met a lot of men. And not that any of this was going to help her right now. Dwelling on what she should’ve done wasn’t going to change the fact that no one was looking for her. That there would be no knight on a white horse charging in to save her. As far as she could figure, she was the only person who could get herself out of this. And that was damn scary.
She must have been dwelling on her regrets for quite a while, because Blue Eyes came in again to check her handcuffs. And once again, he didn’t say a word. He walked directly towards her, bent down, shook the handcuffs again, then went back towards the door.
“What time is it?” Mel asked as he was about to disappear. He stopped dead, and turned around to face her. He said nothing, but walked towards the window and drew back the curtains. Beyond the window was nothing but a wall of trees that looked like they were maybe 10 feet from the house. The light was dim, it looked like it was either dusk or dawn.
After opening the window he left. It bothered Melanie that he never said anything. At least she knew Chubby was an asshole. Blue Eyes, on the other hand, remained a mystery. Why didn’t he talk? Maybe he was even more of an asshole than Chubby, and he said nothing to piss her off. Or maybe he was afraid if he said anything that he’d let something slip that he shouldn’t. Or maybe it was to intimidate her. If that were the reason, she would unhappily admit that it was working. Though Melanie was pretty sure he was an asshole, too. Only someone deeply disturbed could do this to someone she was pretty sure was a complete stranger. Even if he wasn’t the mastermind, he was still involved.
She looked out the window. At least now she had something to look at. It seemed as though it was getting darker by the minute. Which would mean it was later in the day. She couldn’t remember what time the sun was going down these days, thanks to the night shifts. All she knew was that it was dark when she went to bed in the morning and dark when she got out of bed in the early evening. Yes, it was definitely getting darker. So the rest of the day had passed as she sat here in this basement. Just this morning she had walked out the hospital and was happily listening to her mp3 player as she walked home. It seemed like an eternity ago. She wondered if they had already pawned the player to make a few dollars. They’d probably also gone through her backpack. So she’d never see that $50 she had in her wallet again.
Her legs were falling asleep. She shimmied her way up the pole again and leaned against it, shaking them out. They could’ve at least given her a chair or something. Maybe a pillow to sit on. And a blanket. It wasn’t exactly warm in the basement. And the chill was starting to seep deeper into her as the sun went down and it got darker. They’d taken her jacket and left her with only the thin t-shirt she had been wearing at work. And it still reeked of hospital.
She heard footsteps overhead again, followed by the murmur of voices. It sounded like a discussion. Then there were footsteps on the stairs and the door to the room opened again. Blue Eyes entered, followed closely by Chubby. Melanie shuffled around the pole to face them. Blue Eyes had the key ring in his hand, and Chubby was carrying a tray. Blue Eyes unlocked one wrist, then wrapped the other manacle around the pole, leaving one arm free. Chubby set the tray on the ground, on it was an anemic looking sandwich and a glass of water.
“Eat,” said Blue Eyes. “We’ll be back for the tray in 10 minutes.” They both turned to leave, Chubby glaring at her as they left. A man of few word, he was. Melanie tugged gently at her handcuffed wrist as soon as the door was closed behind them. Still tight. She swung her right arm, the free one, around, rotating her shoulder. It felt good to be out of that position. She sat down on the floor cross-legged and inspected what they’d brought her on the tray. A peanut butter and jam sandwich and a glass of water. Not exactly Tavern on the Green. But she decided she was hungry enough she’d settle for less than the fois gras. She pulled the tray closer to the pole and peeled the sandwich open. Since she didn’t know much about these guys, she couldn’t be too careful. Strawberry jam and chunky peanut butter. Excellent. She was five years old again. She smelled the water. Nothing. It looked just like what it was. Dinner. Mel’s stomach rumbled in anticipation of the feast.
She squished the 2 pieces of bread back together and took a bite. PB and J had never tasted so good. Her mouth was so dry she could barely swallow, so she followed that with a swig of water. Some fruit juice would have been better, but beggars can’t be choosers, after all. As she ate she idly turned the tray over, wondering if there was anything she could use that might help her escape. It was plastic, not a single metal piece on it anywhere. The glass was plastic, too. She thought briefly about trying to snap a sharp piece off the tray to use as a weapon, but quickly discounted that since a piece of plastic against 2 grown men didn’t really seem like one of her better ideas. Plus she only had one useful hand. Plus the second they walked in the room and saw the tray was broken they’d know what was going on. No, that wasn’t a good idea at all. Well, back to the drawing board.
Mel sighed and leaned back against the post, chewing silently. She heard footsteps on the stairs again, and quickly swallowed the last of the water. Chubby entered the room first this time. He grabbed her by the upper arm and hauled her to her feet, wrenching on the wrist that was still handcuffed in the process. Mel gasped at the sudden sharp pain. Chubby seemed to grin slightly at that.
“Bathroom break,” he said roughly. Blue Eyes unlocked the handcuffs and followed them into the hall, where they shoved her into the bathroom. As before, they left the door open a crack. Melanie went straight for the loose nail in the window frame. She grabbed it as best she could, but when the window frame had been painted last they had painted right overtop of the nails, so there was a layer of paint she needed to break first. She twisted with the best grip she could get to see if she could break the paint. It didn’t budge.
“I don’t hear anything,” Chubby called from outside the door. Of course they would be listening. She sat to do her business, but kept her hand on the nail, trying to wiggle it back and forth. They gave her the one minute warning, as before, and she continued to work the nail as she washed her hands. Then, suddenly, she felt the paint give underneath her fingers. Just as she managed to get it to twist easily back and forth the door moved. She snatched her hand away and began to wipe her hands dry on her pants. She hoped they hadn’t noticed what she was doing.
Blue Eyes came in and took her by the arm, pulling her out of the bathroom again. She brushed a little too close to Chubby as she was coming out of the bathroom, and he shoved her roughly against the opposite wall.
“Watch it,” he growled. Blue Eyes quickly continued pulling her down the hallway, which she was grateful for, since Chubby looked like he wanted to pound on her a lot more. Soon she was back in the empty room, one wrist handcuffed to the pole.
“We’ll be back in the morning,” Chubby said as he picked up the tray. Then they left. Well, Melanie thought, at least they left one arm free.
With one free arm, she thought, I have a longer reach. And I might be able to reach somtehing I couldn’t before. She looked hopefully around the room again. She figured, if she lay down, she might be able to get her feet to the wall. Not that it would help much, since there was nothing there to reach. And there was no way she could reach any of the walls, since the pole was almost in the direct center of the room. To top it off, she’d decided to wear a sports bra that day at work instead of the usual underwire number, so no hooks or wires to be had there. She made a mental note to never wear a sports bra to work again. She looked up. They had a dropped ceiling in the basement, like most places she’d been in. And sometimes there were wires above a dropped ceiling. She reached up with her free hand, and could almost touch the panels. She slid her handcuffed arm up the pole, but the cuffs caught on the pin that held the post at the right level, just above her waist. She jiggled the cuff, but it had been closed too small to fit around the pin.
She heard footsteps on the stairs again. She quickly sat down facing the door, trying not to look suspicious. The door opened a crack, and Blue Eyes tossed a blanket at her. Then the door closed as quickly as it had opened. It landed just out of Melanie’s reach. She stretched out her leg and used her heel to drag it towards her. While it wasn’t exactly thick, it was better than nothing.
She waited until the thumping on the stairs stopped before she stood up again. She slid the handcuff up as far as it would go and stretched her free arm up as far as she could, standing on her tiptoes. Her fingers barely brushed the tiles on the ceiling. She scrunched the blanket up as best she could into a ball and stood on top of it. Her fingers touched the panel but not enough for her to push it out of place. She jumped slightly and managed to push it out of its slot a bit. She jumped up a few more times and managed to push the tile half way out of its spot. The light didn’t reach up into the ceiling very well, but she could see a few thick wires running through the beams in the ceiling.
She grasped the pole with her handcuffed hand as high as it would go, then put her other hand higher up. Then she tried gripping the pole between her feet as if she was climbing a rope. But her shoes didn’t grip the pole well enough. Maybe she could get a better grip with bare feet. She knelt down and took off her shoes and socks, and tried again. She managed to get slightly higher, but with one hand being held back, she couldn’t get enough leverage to reach any of the wires. And when she wiggled too much her feet would slip back down the pole.
Melanie tried pushing out all the tiles she could reach, but none of them had any wires or anything she thought would help her get out of the handcuffs. And straining against her one shackled wrist was rubbing it raw. Dammit! She could feel it throb as she sat on the floor, staring at the ceiling. There had to be something somewhere! There just had to be! She got back up and slid the tiles back into place. She didn’t want Chubby and Blue Eyes knowing what she was up to. She couldn’t imagine what they might do if they found out she had been rooting around in their ceiling tiles. She slowly put her socks and shoes back on, her feet cold from standing on the bare concrete floor.
Outside the window it was dark. So dark she could no longer see the trees only a few feet away. The room was getting colder as time passed, and she wrapped the blanket around her as best she could. At least it was thick enough to take the chill off. As she warmed up a little she could feel the weariness of the day creeping into her brain. She hadn’t had nearly enough sleep to compensate for her night shift, and she had been keyed up all day. And somehow, knowing it would be at least until morning before either of the men upstairs checked in on her again was somehow comforting. She was at least safe for a few more hours.
She pulled the blankets as close as she could and leaned against the pole. She thought of her mother, probably at home, likely already sleeping. She was an early riser, and usually asleep well before 9 pm. Her mother lived alone now, long divorced and all her children having moved out. Melanie’s sister lived with a friend near the college now, and her brother had moved out just after meeting his future wife. Her family…she wondered how long it would be before they knew what had happened to her. She wondered how long it would be before they knew where she had been kept or how long she had been kept here…