Brian Keene: Entombed

I hadn’t realized that until now. She’d suspected. Even then, she’d suspected that I was lying to her. She’d known about me and Hannah—known that it was more than a simple friendship. So why hadn’t she said something at that point? Why hadn’t she confronted me about it? Why did she let it drag on so long, doing incalculable damage to us all? She’d made me lie to her, and then allowed me to feel guilty about it. The more I thought about it, the more enraged I became. All that time I’d wasted.

“All this time that I’ve wasted…” Her lilting voice taunted me.

“Fuck this shit.”

I stormed out of the media room, no longer caring if the others heard me or not. In fact, I hoped they would. That way, I could deal with them quickly, rather than drawing this hunt out any longer than it had to be. The only thing that mattered now was finding Alyssa and getting some answers for why she’d done the things that she’d done.

The corridor was empty. Alyssa’s voice echoed softly down the hall. Before, it had been ethereal and drifting. Now, it seemed real. More solid. It stayed in one place, making it much easier for me to find her location. I glanced over my shoulder. Far down at the other end of the hall, the dining room doors remained closed. If anyone had heard me, or heard Alyssa for that matter, they weren’t reacting. Of course, that didn’t mean it couldn’t still be a trap. Maybe Damonte or one of the others was waiting right around the corner. If so, then I had something for them.

Pausing, I moved over to the wall and stood with my back against it. Then, flattening myself out as best I could (which was easy, given then fact that I didn’t have a gut to suck in anymore), I inched forward and slowly edged around the corner. This hallway was empty, too, but Alyssa’s voice was nearer. My pulse pounded. As I walked, she stopped singing and began to hum instead.

“That won’t help you,” I whispered. “You wanted me to find you? Well, be careful what you wish for, sweetheart. You’re about to get it.”

The pharmacy was on my left. The door to it was closed but I could see a glow coming through the crack at the bottom of the door, indicating that the lights were on inside. I put my ear to the door and listened. After a moment, I confirmed that the humming was coming from further down the hall. I tested the knob and found it unlocked, so I nudged the door open and gave the pharmacy a quick, cursory check. It was unoccupied. I stared at all of the museum displays and placards, and wished fervently that the pharmacy still had some real drugs or medicine in it, rather than the empty bottles we used on the tour to make the surroundings look authentic, as they had when the bunker was operational. At that moment, I craved painkillers almost more than I did food. There was nothing in the room that I could use for a weapon, either. I considered smashing one of the glass display cases or mirrors, but the risk of being overheard wasn’t worth it for a mere shard or sliver. My razor knife, screwdriver and newspaper rod would have to suffice. I’d killed with two of them already, and was eager to try out the latest addition, as well.

Closing the pharmacy door behind me, I continued down the hall, following the siren call of Alyssa’s humming. She was doing it sporadically now, as if she’d forgotten the tune. As I neared one of the lounge areas, she started up again, but the tune sputtered into a series of choked, muffled sobs. I peeked my head through the open door and saw Alyssa kneeling on the lounge room floor. Her back was to me, and she’d buried her face in her hands. All I could see was the back of her head and her shoulders, which trembled in time with her grief. My heart broke, seeing her like that. I wanted to call out to her, wanted to run to her and take her into my arms and tell her that everything would be all right, that it would all be okay now, and that I was sorry for everything I’d done, and that we could just start over—that we could just hit the restart button and renew our relationship. We could go back to the way things were before. I desperately wanted that.

Tears ran down my bloody cheeks. I wiped them away and sniffled. If Alyssa heard me, she didn’t react. Instead, she attempted to start humming again. It only lasted a few seconds before breaking into a new round of sobs. I eased the door shut behind me, not quite closing it, but enough that we would have some privacy for our reunion. The door made no sound, and the tension began to drain from my body. I stepped closer. She was so beautiful, even from behind. Even after months trapped in this bunker. I licked my lips, trying to work up the nerve to speak. Still holding the newspaper rod, I reached for her, not quite having the courage to actually touch her and make my presence known.

“I miss you.” Her voice was muffled through her hands. “I miss you so much, Jose.”

I froze. Jose? My name was Pete, or Peter as she referred to me when she was annoyed or angry. Who the fuck was Jose? I thought about all of the other men in her life—family, friends and co-workers. I’d never heard her mention a Jose before. Was he her lover? Had Alyssa been cheating on me, too? Had she let me feel guilty and forced me to lie to her in an effort to protect our relationship and maintain our happiness, while seeing somebody else all the while behind my back?

My anger returned, rushing back into my body in a flood of pent-up emotion. Tremors shot through me. My hands and feet trembled. My ears burned. The blood vessels in my forehead and neck felt like they were going to burst. So did my eyeballs. They seemed to inflate inside the sockets, and I wondered what I’d see if I looked in a mirror at that moment. Would my reflection be the monster they all said I was? I thought it might. At that moment, I was okay with being the monster. Somebody had to be.

Alyssa kept crying, whispering Jose’s name over and over again. Bile burned my throat. I bit my lip to keep from screaming. My teeth sank into the fresh cuts, and the pain was exquisite. Blood ran down my chin like the juice from a fresh peach. Shivering, I went rigid. The newspaper rod slipped from my grasp and clattered to the floor, and for a brief second, time itself seemed to freeze.

Alyssa stiffened at the sound of the rod hitting the floor. Her sobs turned into a gasp. She began to turn around and I charged forward. Her eyes widened when she saw me. She tried to stand up and back away at the same time, but her feet got tangled under her. She pitched forward, and would have fallen on her face had I not been there to catch her. My arms shot out and I wrapped my hands around her throat.

“Don’t worry,” I whispered. “I’ve got you. I won’t let you fall.”

Alyssa stiffened in my grasp, and tried to push me away. Her movements were weak, but frantic. I tightened my grip.

“It’s okay,” I said, trying to soothe her. “I won’t let go. I’ll never let go again, sweetheart.”

Whispering soothing words of comfort, I lowered her to the floor. I tried to be gentle about it, but the back of her head smacked hard against the linoleum. Alyssa’s bangs slipped in front of her face. She twisted her body, thrashing and trying to get away, and as she did, her hair parted, revealing her eyes. Those same beautiful eyes that I’d stared into so many times before were now wide and bulging and filled with fear. Tiny red blood vessels filled the whites of them like spider-webs.

“Calm down, Alyssa.” I squeezed harder, relishing the feel as my fingers dug deep into the flesh of her throat. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Her tongue popped out of her mouth like a glistening jack-in-the-box. Shifting my weight, I kept my grip on her neck and knelt on her stomach with both of my knees. Her entire body convulsed beneath me. She slapped the floor with her hands and kicked out behind us. She tried to raise her leg to knee me in the back, but I dug in deeper, sinking my fingernails into her flesh. Her tongue stuck out farther.