Sarah Durst - The Lost

“Oh, don’t go, Peter!” Claire jumps to her feet. I hear her food spill onto the floor. There’s a glug as if a drink has poured out. “Please! She is different! I can tell!”

He ducks out of the dining room.

I follow him out of the dining room and halt in the hallway. “I didn’t mean...”

But the hall is empty.

At least, I think it is.

I peer into the darkness. I don’t see any movement. I touch the front door. The dead bolt is still locked. He couldn’t have left, at least not that way. “Peter? Are you here?”

He doesn’t answer. I step into the kitchen. The refrigerator is a hulking shadow in one corner. It hums, and I think about opening it for the light. But no. Can’t risk it.

I skirt around the kitchen table, and then I head for the living room. All the bookcases are shadows, as are the couch, the chairs, the coffee table. I don’t see his silhouette anywhere. I check both bedrooms as well as the bathroom. He could be in a closet or under a bed or hidden in one of the darker shadows in the corners of the rooms, but why would he be? “Peter!”

He can’t be upstairs. I would have heard the stairs creak. Still, I feel my way up the stairs, one step at a time, kicking each one before I step. It’s darkest in the middle of the stairs where the moonlight from windows above and below don’t quite meet. At the top of the stairs, I look around. The stuffed rabbit still sits in the middle of the floor. A small shadow, he looks lonely. The attic room is otherwise empty, and the window is still locked. I pick up Mr. Rabbit and carry him downstairs.

“Claire?” I return to the dining room.

“Did you find him?” She’s behind me. I jump.

I shake my head, then remember she most likely can’t see me. “He must have left.”

“But the door is still locked.” She’d noticed that, too. Smart kid. “Maybe he’s playing hide-and-seek! Olly olly oxen free! Come out, Peter!” She scampers through the house. I hear cabinet and closet doors open and shut.

After a few seconds of listening, I have an idea, born of supreme paranoia. I enter the kitchen and feel my way to the refrigerator. For the barest of seconds, I crack open the fridge enough so that light spills into the room. I see what I need: a mop. I shut the door, plunging the room into darkness that feels more complete than before, and I feel my way through the thick blackness to the mop. It leans in the space between the counter and the trash can. By the time I reach it, my eyes have adjusted to the darkness again. I leave Mr. Rabbit on the kitchen counter and take the mop.

With the mop, I follow the sound of Claire’s footsteps and join her in the second bedroom, her bedroom. She opens the closet door, and I jab into the closet with the mop and wave it back and forth. I hit only clothes. No one shrieks. We repeat the procedure under the bed and then we progress from room to room until we have swept every closet and cabinet large enough to hold a tall, muscular man.

In the hallway again, Claire says, “He really left.”

“He’ll be back in the morning. I’m his personal vendetta, remember?”

“Maybe he’s in the void. He enters it at least once a day to search for lost people.” She frowns prettily, the faint light from the front window falling across her face. “Or maybe he really doesn’t like you.”

I feel a pang at that thought but push it aside. I don’t care what he thinks of me, so long as he helps me get home. I don’t need to make friends, even with shockingly handsome and strangely fascinating men who might as well have walked right out of my subconscious. “Also possible.”

There isn’t much more to say or do after that. Feeling my way to the kitchen, I lean the mop against the wall where I found it and then I return to the hallway. I’ll clean up from dinner in the morning when there’s light. Or not, since I have no plans to stay here and it’s abandoned anyway. Besides, there’s a massive junk pile outside. Any mess inside pales in comparison.

To Mom’s chagrin, my half of the apartment isn’t known for its neatness. I hate the trip to the Laundromat so I divide my clothes into fresh, passably fresh, and doomed. The fresh clothes are in the closet and drawers. The doomed are in the laundry bag. But the passably fresh are stacked on the dresser, draped over a chair, and piled in the corner. At least I know what’s there. I don’t really know what’s in the corners of this house, even after prodding them with a mop. At best, spiders. At worst... “Guess we should sleep.” Granted, I can’t imagine how I’ll sleep here, knowing where I am, knowing what’s outside...or worse and more accurately, not knowing. But the doors are locked, the broken windows are fixed, and I can’t stand around in a dark hallway and worry the entire night.

I look at the door to the master bedroom. I can tell from the angle of the shadows that it’s halfway open. I think I left it that way when we searched the house, but I’m not certain.

“Good night!” Claire bounds into her room with more enthusiasm for bedtime than any six-year-old I’ve ever heard of. Maybe she’s excited to have her own room and her own bed. I don’t know for certain, but I bet she’s already slept in far more doorways and on far more benches than I ever have.

I stop by the bathroom first. Windowless, it’s so dark that I have to feel my way to the sink. I turn on the water, but I can’t see whether it’s clear or sludge. I don’t drink it, even though my mouth feels dry. Instead I splash my face and then use the toilet, all the while listening for other sounds—footsteps, breathing, anything. I’ll have to find toothpaste and a toothbrush, as well as clothes I can sleep in, if I’m stuck here any longer. I hope I don’t have to. Maybe I’m being a stupid optimist, but I hope this will be the only night I spend here.

Returning to the master bedroom, I run my hands over the sheets. I don’t feel anything like a snake or a rodent or a handsome, enigmatic, and infuriating man who seems like he shouldn’t be real and maybe isn’t.

I kick off my shoes, slide off my pants, climb into bed in just my men’s shirt and my underwear, and close my eyes. I can’t sleep. Of course.

I try every trick I know:

Think of something boring.

Think of something nice.

Count to one hundred.

Count backward from one hundred.

Curl on my side.

Lie on my stomach.

Flop on my back.

Twist. Turn. Flail.

I even hug Mr. Rabbit...but then I can’t remember when I moved him from the kitchen counter to the bed, and that makes me even more awake. I must have picked him up before the bathroom. I remember returning the mop...yes, I must have taken him then, though I don’t remember doing it.

I can’t relax. Every muscle feels as if it’s listening. I wait for a closet door to creak, for a window to break, for the front door to unlock, for the stairs to groan.

I wonder where Peter is. He must have returned to his apartment. Or gone to perch on more fence posts inside a dust storm, looking for more people like me. I wish he hadn’t left. He said he’d protect me, but I don’t feel at all protected. Eyes wide-open, I stare at the shadow of the dresser, the moonlit window, and the bedroom door.

The door creaks open. I freeze. My heart thuds louder. I don’t know what to do. All my waiting and listening and worrying, and I never planned what to do if anyone came in...

“Lauren?” It’s Claire. “Are you awake?”

“Yes.” I think I sound normal. I can still feel my heart race inside my rib cage. It’s as fast as the flutter of butterfly wings inside a trap. I think of the horror movie scene this would make: little angelic girl in a tattered pink princess dress, barefoot at midnight, knife in her hand. “Claire, out of curiosity, do you have your knife?”