Locke up and dosed him up on some more painkillers. I settled the glass of water to his lips and made him wash it down. Then I checked under the bandages, making sure he hadn’t moved enough in his sleep to have re-opened them.
Satisfied, I pushed him back down on the pillow and ran my hands through his hair, comforting him. It always left me sad when he shut his eyes to my touch, savouring it.
Locke was deprived of love. He pushed it away like it was poison, but when he was vulnerable and weak, he needed it like air.
Just before Locke fell back asleep, I whispered over him, “Please tell me Conor is okay.”
“He’s okay,” he returned groggily.
“He’s safe?”
“He’s safe.”
Please, please be safe.
When mid-morning came, Megan was at my door, unloading about Penny’s sleepover when Locke came barrelling down the stairs, dressed in last night’s suit. His suit jacket was on, covering the blood on his shirt.
Megan’s eyes went wide, her shock deep as she glared accusingly at me, at what she’d just walked in on.
“It’s not what you think,” I sharply told her as Penny blazed past us, already filled with energy for the day.
She studied my pale face before noticing how stiffly Locke moved. “What is he making you do?” she asked me, suspiciously.
“Nothing,” I lied just as Locke reached the bottom.
But it wasn’t nothing.
It was Locke’s everything.
His torment.
His torture.
His revenge.
I stopped the car on the side of the road on the outskirts of town in front of an old abandoned home. I hurried out, running into the forest just beyond the yard. The yard itself looked the same every time: overgrown with weeds and tall grass; there was junk strewn everywhere, including a rusted car that was probably some animal’s home now. To make matters worse, I always had to pass this ancient slide, cracked and on its side.
I should have hidden under the slide, he’d said.
I shuddered.
I hated being here.
I hated it more in the dark.
It was freaky. I couldn’t fathom how four boys wound up playing this far out of town. I couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that one of them disappeared not far from this very house.
Not far at all.
I didn’t have to search for the hidden door. I’d memorized it at this point. Hidden by bushes and tall grass (at one point camouflaged so you couldn’t even notice its existence), I found it poking out from the ground. It was like a storm shelter, only the doors were steel, and its purpose wasn’t to hide you from a storm. No, it was more sinister than that.
I stopped before it, fighting for air in my lungs.
The door was already open.
I always took a moment before I waded in. Fear shot up my spine, and I closed my eyes to suppress it. I told myself he needed me. He needed me to stop him from doing something very bad. Or maybe he’d done it already and I was too late.
Adrenaline replaced my fear and I ducked down, climbing the steep steps to the bottom of the small room. It was completely black inside. I pulled my phone out of my pocket and turned its flashlight on.
“Locke,” I whispered, hesitating.
I shined the light around the room as I stepped in. I nearly tripped over something hard under my feet. I looked down, my breaths growing shallow at the collection of old toys scattered throughout the dirt floor. From my understanding, these weren’t the original toys Max had played with when he’d been trapped in here. These were ones he’d replaced himself. Why he did that, I didn’t know.
Sometimes you just know when not to ask.
The toy beneath me was a car with one wheel missing. Not far from it was a headless action figure. I swallowed hard and told myself to breathe. I directed the light from one corner to the next, praying I wouldn’t find him hurt.
“Locke,” I repeated, my voice steadier now. “I’m here.”
I took a few more steps in, trying not to linger on the small details: like the colouring books torn to pieces, or the kid’s chair on its side, or the claw marks on the cement walls, or the…bloody handprints.
I could see the anguish as I waded further in. I blinked and images flared through my mind. Of a child alone in here. A child tormented. Abused.
I didn’t know why I was searching for him. I knew where I would find him. It was where I found him