Brian Freeman - The Burying Place

She separated a piece of celery, sliced off its frilly head, and carefully cut the stalk into half-inch segments, which she dumped in the bowl. She ran the grapes under the faucet, pulled off a dozen, and cut each one in half. She added them to the bowl.

'It's supposed to include walnuts, but I don't have any walnuts. Apples are crunchy enough, so I won't miss them.'

Valerie sliced the apple down the middle and cut away slices from the core. She tasted one and made a face. It was tart. Like an angel, Callie giggled at her mother and slapped the tray in front of her with tiny hands. Her blonde curls danced on her forehead. Valerie winked and diced the apple slices and mixed them in with the celery and grapes.

'Now for my top-secret ingredient,' she said.

Valerie ran the knife all the way around the black avocado and twisted the two halves apart. As she buried the blade in the avocado seed to remove it, her phone rang on the kitchen counter. She froze, her lower lip quivering. The noise went on, musical and insistent. When she glanced at the phone, she saw her sister's name in the Caller ID box.

'That's Aunt Denise,' she said with a strange lilt in her voice. 'I don't think we need to talk to her right now, do we? Not when we're busy making a salad.'

The phone went silent. Her smile cracked as she stared at Callie.

'There's plenty of time to call her back. We can call her when we're done here. OK? Now where was I? I think we're almost ready.'

She scooped half of the avocado out of its husk and cut it lengthwise into strips, which she dropped one at a time into the salad. She pried the lid off the yogurt and spooned it into the bowl. She cut the lemon in half and squeezed juice over the salad. With a fork and spoon, she mixed everything together.

'Doesn't that look delicious?' she said. She took a forkful and tasted it. 'That's good.'

She sat down at the island and ate each bite of the salad slowly, staring at Callie as she did. Her daughter's eyes followed her. Callie made noises; she'd be talking soon, saying words. She memorized her little girl's face, her two new white teeth, her dimpled smile. She savored these quiet moments when it was just the two of them.

When her bowl was nearly empty, her phone rang again. She stopped with the fork halfway to her mouth. The horror of anticipation bled across her face.

The caller ID this time said Blair Rowe.

Valerie's eyes went blank. The phone rang and rang, and then the music ended. She snapped out of her trance.

'Isn't it amazing how everyone always calls when you're in the middle of a meal?' she asked her daughter. 'I think we'll just turn off that silly phone now. There really isn't anyone I want to talk to tonight. Other than you, of course.'

She switched off the power on her phone. When she bent over the salad bowl again, something dropped from her face and splattered on the counter. Tears. She touched her cheek in surprise. 'Look at that, I'm crying. Isn't that strange?'

Callie cocked her head with a serious expression on her face. It always looked to Valerie as if she was thinking about something very important.

'You're getting so big,' Valerie told her. 'And so beautiful. When you grow up, you're going to be a gorgeous young woman.'

She took her empty salad bowl to the sink and washed it and put it away. She returned the avocado half, the lemon half, and the celery and grapes to the refrigerator. Opening the chrome garbage pail with her foot, she slid the remnants into the trash and then used a paper towel to wipe the counter. She ran the knife under the sink and rubbed it with a sponge until it was spotless.

When she was done, she opened a spice cabinet and slowly spun the lazy susan inside until she found what she wanted. It was a bottle she had purchased a year ago, before she got pregnant. A bottle she had never opened. A bottle filled to its narrow neck with tablets of aspirin.

She turned back and looked at the high chair. Callie was gone. Valerie's smile slowly dissolved, and the light went out of her eyes.

'From now on, I'll never leave you alone,' Valerie promised her. 'Never ever. I'll always be with you.'

Kasey had no idea how long she had been clinging to the frigid metal pipe. It could have been seconds. It could have been an hour. Time had no meaning in the darkness. Her arms grew thick and heavy, and the cold burned her skin, and all she wanted to do was let go. But she didn't. She couldn't.

He was gone. For now. She had watched him take the flashlight and pick his way through the debris, and then the light had vanished behind a fragmented wall. Somewhere on the far side of the building, she'd heard a steel door opening and closing. Since then, she had heard only the other noises of the ruins: the water torture dripping from overhead and the morbid squeal of the rats.

She held out little hope of rescue. She screamed — ' Help me! Help!' — but her voice bounced around the decimated building, and in the aftermath, she heard nothing at all. No one came running. No one shouted back. Wherever she was, she was on her own.

In the early minutes, she didn't dare move for fear of dislodging the pipe or slipping and losing her hold on the metal itself. Eventually, as her strength waned, she decided she had to try. If she made a mistake, she died, but if she did nothing, she died anyway. She had to stay alive. She had to escape.

Carefully, she eased one hand off the pipe and examined the rope with her fingers, looking for a way to undo the knot and slip the noose from around her neck. She pried at the twine, but the knot was tight and unyielding. With two hands, she might have been able to dislodge it, but not with one. She worked at it until her other arm groaned in protest, and when she felt her grip slipping, she brought her hand back to the pipe.

She thought about shimmying up the rope itself to where it connected to the ceiling joist, but she didn't think she had enough strength in her arms to make the climb. She also thought about bringing up her legs like a gymnast and slinging them over the pipe, but she worried that the fragile metal would buckle under the pressure.

Kasey decided to see where the pipe itself went. Prying her fingers off the metal, she slowly moved her left hand three inches. She repeated the process with her right hand. The metal was cold and wet, and her fingers nearly gave way. She moved again, another three inches. And then again. The progress was excruciatingly slow. The pain and cold thumped in her brain and made her dizzy. Her eyes saw strange things in the darkness. She tried to move again and couldn't. When she screamed at her muscles, they refused to take orders. Instead, she hung there, paralyzed, feeling the pipe grow loose and slippery under her fingers.

It would be easy to let go. Easy to give up. Let the metal slip away, and let the rope take over.

No.

It was a test. She couldn't fail. Calm descended over her like a wave, and she sloughed her body along the stretch of pipe. She shunted her bound legs and slowly swept the space to her left with her feet extended. At the very edge of her t — s, she brushed something hard. Concrete. A wall. She peeled away her fingers and moved again, three more inches, and when she extended her legs, she could brace the bottom of her feet against the side of the wall. Flakes of paint scraped away under her skin. If she could find a t — hold, she could reposition herself and use both hands to attack the rope around her neck.

Kasey tried to slide another few inches, but her head snapped to her right, choking her against the coil of rope. She had extended all the play left in the rope where it connected to the ceiling. It wouldn't go any farther. She was trapped.

She reached out again with her legs, but this time, she moved too quickly, and her left hand lost its grip and fell. Her right hand clenched the freezing pipe and hung on, but the rope cut into her neck and choked off her breathing. She gasped and spat, dangling by one hand. Frantically, she grabbed for the pipe with her other hand, and as she did, her fingers brushed a scrap of metal hanging just above her. She grasped it, dropped it, and tried for the pipe again, and finally she curled her fingers around the thick length of pipe and pulled herself back up. The pressure on her neck eased enough for her to breathe.