fixing Coco a bottle of milk for the inevitable midnight cry of “Ya-ya!”
But on returning to bed, bottle of milk in hand, I heard a noise. A moan, or a sort of low cry. At first I thought it was Coco, bang on schedule, demanding her milk.
I walked quickly along the hallway to the stairs. The door at the end of the hall was ajar. By this point I knew the inside of the house intimately, from the yellowing skirting boards to which floorboards creaked and where gangs of spiders liked to hang out, and I happened to know for a fact that this door was always locked. Fiercely, unremittingly locked. The door led to the Basement, that unspoken hinterland into which I was forbidden to venture.
A chilly breeze washed over me, a breeze that was belching from the depths of the basement. A sour odor permeated the air. My mind spun to the cause of such a weird smell. A torture chamber. Or a vat of chemicals for storing dead bodies. Stop it, I told my brain. It’s probably just used for storage, like every normal cellar. Maybe someone’s giving the place a clean. That’ll be the reason for the smell, not formaldehyde or decomposing corpses.
Maren or Tom would be down there, scrubbing their completely innocent, corpse-free basement with eco-friendly liquids. But just then, I heard another sound that came from the basement, and immediately two thoughts laced together: Gaia had risen from her bed and followed me. And she had gone down into the basement.
I opened the door and stepped into the darkness. I reached for the light switch and flicked on a single, naked bulb that revealed steps to nothingness.
“Gaia?” I hissed. “Gaia, are you down there? Come up, please?”
No answer. I turned and glanced behind me, fearful of getting another write-up in Maren’s Book of Wrong.
“Gaia?” I called in the direction of her room. If she was there she would answer. But I was met with silence.
I glanced down into the gloom, seeking out the familiar shape of Gaia at the bottom of the stairs, but there was nothing. “Gaia?” I called again, and this time there was a distant whimper, and in an instant I feared she’d tripped and fallen down those horrible concrete steps. The sort that you’d really not want to fall down, as you’d be left with a broken rib or two. So I quickly took to the steps, but I was only halfway down when the lights suddenly went out. A second later, the door slammed shut. I froze. I was in pitch darkness and barefoot.
“Gaia, are you down here?” I said. I tried to listen into the silence, but all I could hear was the rush of blood in my ears.
A moment later, a voice.
NO.
A hoarse voice.
Not Gaia’s voice.
I froze in the dark, every muscle in my body flooded with terror, my eyes searching out any chink of light to reveal who had spoken. As I turned I felt something grab me, a hand clutching the breast pocket on my shirt. I screamed and lurched backward, stumbling and tripping up the stairs to the door. I reached it and turned the handle, but it was shut tight. I pounded my fists against the door. “Help!” I shouted. “There’s someone down here!”
After what seemed like an eternity but was probably about three and a half seconds, the door opened. I stumbled and fell on my knees, vomiting all over the feet of the person standing in front of me.
Tom. He stared down at me in disgust.
“What’s happened?” a woman’s voice said. I recognized it as Derry’s voice, the woman who’d picked me up at the airport.
I felt like a rag doll as she and Clive lowered me into a chair in the kitchen. I saw Tom check the basement door thoroughly before coming in to join us. His face was flushed. I’d crossed a line. I’d gone into the Verboten Basement and puked all over his designer shoes. I was probably going to be fired. But I was so weak and terrified that I didn’t care.
Clive put the kettle on and made small talk about air pressure and seasonal affective disorder and wouldn’t it be great if a Chinese takeaway was nearby. Derry took a mop and bucket out to the hallway, and I remembered with stinging embarrassment that I’d vomited out there. When she returned she sat down with me and rubbed my back. I was shaking like a leaf