Anne Frasier - Play Dead

"The tunnels have been sealed for years," the man said.

"I'd like to see the entrance anyway," Elise told him.

"We don't allow anybody down there."

"Mr. Simms, do I need to remind you that a crime was committed in your establishment?"

"It's just… that area of the home is kind of for overflow…"

Audrey immediately imagined piles of dead bodies. The smell, along with the image, began to make her feel a little dizzy.

"I'm not an inspector," Elise reminded him.

"Okay, okay."

Annoyed, he led them to the elevator, which took them to the basement level.

What a switch, from all tidy and plush to damp and crumbling stone foundation that smelled like mildew and rotting wood.

The funeral director stayed in the elevator. "Keep to the right," he said, waving his hand. "The tunnel entrance is in the last small room. Low ceiling. You'll need to duck. I have to get back upstairs." He pushed a button. The elevator door closed. A motor kicked in, taking Mr. Mortician away.

The floor was tabby cement that had been poured over sloped, uneven ground. The light was bad, and there were a lot of deep shadows and dark corners.

Elise clicked on the flashlight.

It was one of those cool police flashlights that really lit up the room. The bright white beam darted around, then landed on a shelf full of small cardboard boxes. Each box had a name and date.

"Apparently relatives don't always pick up their loved ones," Elise commented.

Sweet kitty.

Audrey didn't like being down there with a bunch of dead people even if they were ashes. At the same time, she was thinking about how nobody was going to believe her at school tomorrow when she told her friends where she'd been. They were going to, like, think it was the coolest.

A lot of people thought cremated bodies burned down to a tiny little pile of ashes. But Audrey had seen a show on the Discovery Channel, and it told how after the thing they cooked them in was cool enough to open, bones and teeth were still there. Mixed with the ashes. They had a machine that looked like a little cement mixer they dumped everything into. The machine ground up what was left.

Gross.

She fell into step behind her mom.

"Watch your head."

Elise shone the flashlight at the low ceiling, then back to a floor that had turned to rock and dirt. They entered a second room lined with metal shelves crammed with supplies. Bottles of pink liquid claimed to be embalming fluid. Others were called cavity cleaner. Pore sealer. Jugular tubes. Body inserts. Expression formers. Casket Mate, whatever that was. On the floor were drums labeled Drying Compound, Lightly Fragranced.

Audrey was feeling dizzy again.

Just a tunnel.

Right.

Her mother had said they were looking for just a tunnel. Maybe, if it was a tunnel from Night of the Living Dead. Her parents-well, her dad and Vivian-wouldn't let her watch those kinds of movies, but some of her friends had seen them so many times that they laughed at the scary parts. Audrey had been initiated at a sleepover. She'd had bad dreams for two weeks.

Cavity cleaner.

Body inserts.

She felt like she was going to throw up. She took a few deep breaths, then hurried to catch up with her mother, who was peering into an even smaller room.

Audrey couldn't wait to see what was in there. Ha-ha.

They had to walk hunched over.

It was tiny. And thankfully empty.

One wall was brick instead of stone.

"Is that it?" Audrey asked.

She'd seen the sealed tunnel at the Pirates' House Restaurant, so she'd kind of known what to expect, but still it was a letdown. Just a wall. How boring was that?

"Look." Elise pointed the light along the left edge where the bricks stopped, then down to a pile of rubble. "Someone's been doing a little excavating."

Audrey hadn't known what she'd expected when she'd come along. She hadn't really thought about it. But now her heart began beating faster.

She'd heard about the body that had been stolen from the funeral home. It had been all over the news, but suddenly the story changed from things kids at school were joking about to an actual crime. And here was a clue! A real clue!

She'd never seen her mom in action, actually working on a case. Suddenly she felt kind of amazed by her, kind of proud.

Elise pulled some bricks free and shone the light through the jagged black gap.

"Should we go inside?" Audrey asked, excited and scared at the same time.

"No. I need to get a crime scene team down here before anybody disturbs anything."

"Can I at least look?"

"Here." Elise handed her the heavy flashlight.

Audrey stepped forward and pointed the beam through the hole.

A tunnel. Cut from rock and earth, with the ceiling curved and lined with brick. In the distance it appeared to end, but Audrey figured it really turned.

Something hit her arm with a plop.

A bug! A huge black cockroach!

She jumped back, shook her arm, and screamed, dropping the flashlight.

Elise let out a funny yelp and knocked the roach from Audrey's arm. The bug went scurrying away, hunting for darkness. Then Elise retrieved the dead flashlight. She shook it and it made a broken-glass kind of sound.

Audrey gave her a pained look. "Sorry. But did you see that thing? It was huge. Mutant or something. Like half cockroach, half dog." She shivered dramatically.

"Jesus," Elise said under her breath, her own shudder mirroring Audrey's. "I hate those things."

That made Audrey feel better. Mainly because she'd always thought her mom wasn't afraid of anything.

It was nice to know she was.

I watched and listened, making sure the hallways of Mary of the Angels were quiet and no one was coming or going.

I didn't mind the wait. Detective Gould was with me.

I cuddled him. I tasted him in his state of simulated death.

Then I retrieved the gurney from the basement.

It was the perfect way to move deadweight. I only had to drag his limp body onto the stainless steel surface, then pop the release lever, raising him off the floor.

Before leaving, I laid down a confusion trick in the doorway so no one would be able to follow.

I double-checked the hall.

Empty.

My heart was beating madly as I silently wheeled him down the strip of carpet. I pushed the black button and hoped no one else summoned the elevator.

We made it to the basement with no trouble. I quickly pushed Detective Gould through a dimly lit room to the tunnel entrance. I lowered the gurney and removed him, dragging his body through the opening, then following with the collapsed gurney. In the weak glow of a small lantern with Detective Gould lying near my feet, I replaced the bricks.

I'd become fascinated with the tunnels years ago while exploring my house, poking around in the secret rooms. Closed doors had always held a curiosity for me, and a sealed-up wall was an even bigger attraction. A few nights of digging and I'd made a hole big enough to crawl through. That had led to years of off-and-on exploration.

I put Detective Gould back on the gurney. Time to be on our way. I bent close and brushed my lips across his.

So still.

So silent.

Was he breathing?

I laid my cheek against his mouth, and was eventually rewarded with a soft stirring of air.

Why did I like my men so docile? I often asked myself. Helpless and at my mercy?

My answer was always the same. Why would anybody want them any other way? That and the fact that the state of death had always attracted me. A shrink might say it was all those years spent in a house that had once been a morgue. I don't think so. The fascination was something that came from deep inside, from my DNA.

The tunnel was darker than night, and the light cast by the lantern could illuminate only a few yards ahead.