You would never guess it, but I’m kind of claustrophobic. I always panic when I enter an elevator or am stuck in a small room with a bunch of people. I do my best not to show it because it kind of embarrasses me, but I can feel the sweat forming on my brow and my heart beat quicken when I get myself in those situations. It gets even worse when I come into contact with people who want my autograph. They swarm around me as if I’m not even a human being, pushing on me, grabbing for my clothes or my jewelry, anything they can cling to. I once had someone rip off a necklace that my grandmother had just given to me for my birthday. She was screaming and crying and grabbed for my neck. It was shortly after that my family thought it was best to hire a bodyguard.
The room was a disaster. It was clear that those two police officers were looking for something specific because of the way things were just randomly thrown all over the place. They probably didn’t even give a second thought to cleaning up the mess, figuring that no one knew the room existed in the first place. This brought about another valid point. They knew about this room, which meant maybe they actually knew the Wainrights. Sure it was possible that they just happened upon the room, I mean that’s what I did, but that was doubtful.
Clothes were strewn around and scattered in piles like mini ant hills and a few boxes were overturned with years of memorabilia everywhere. I bent down and picked up a few papers that were lying on the floor by my feet. They were yellowed by age and the pencil marks faded, but they clearly looked like letters to me.
I squinted to try to make out what was being said but aside from a few words here or there, I could barely tell what it was about. I did recognize the name at the end. The letter was clearly signed by Belle.
Obviously the police didn’t feel like it was important enough to take with them, so I dropped the letter and moved on. I knew nothing in plain site would be of value. I would have to find something hidden somewhere, the question was where? The room was so small it seemed almost impossible to hide anything anywhere.
I started walking around the room and stomping hard on the floor boards, remembering how she had hidden a diary underneath one in the attic. Maybe she did that up here too. Sure enough one of them gave way under my feet, almost sailing me to the ground. I noticed when I gained my balance that a few nails on that floorboard were missing. Searching the room with my eyes, I smiled when I found a crowbar to help pry the board loose.
“I should be a policeman, I’m that good.” I gloated to myself as I pried the board away and sure enough there were papers hidden underneath. I was hoping there would be a diary but at least this was something I guess.
I sat down and made myself comfortable, well as comfortable as you can get on a hardwood floor with nails sticking out all over the place. Crossing my legs Indian style I went to work reading the first letter. It was odd that instead of being mailed they all sat in a pile under a floor board in a secret room. I quickly understood why after reading the first few sentences of the first letter I picked up.
I don’t know what to do! It’s gotten so bad, this is the only place in the world I feel safe. I even managed to do what you suggested. I hid a few knives around my room including one in my teddy bear. I probably will never have to use it, but like you said, better safe than sorry.
I know I’ll never mail this because I’m too chicken but now I know I made a huge mistake. I should have come with you when I had the chance. I should have ran and never looked back, now it’s too late and I’m stuck! God tell me what to do!! I wish I knew what I was supposed to --
I turned the page hoping there would be more, but it seemed like she cut herself off. Maybe someone came in or maybe she just stopped and started crying. That was the mental picture I formed in my mind. I saw her as an angsty teenager sitting right where I was in a different time, hands over eyes as she cried out of desperation. I wish I knew what she was talking about. I tossed that letter to the side and went straight for the next one, hoping I would find the answers I was looking for.
List of things I’ll need:
Clothes
A few blankets
A pillow
Things out of my safe deposit box (I’m not sure how to get those. I might have to try to steal the key from my father as he’s sleeping.)
My diary
A gun
*Call Madison about the driver’s license.
Belle was planning on running away. I wonder who Madison was and if she was still around. Maybe there was a way to get in touch with her, not that I could ever picture myself doing that. I bet Kevin would though. I could see Kevin calling her up and asking her a ton of questions. Maybe her number was somewhere in the pile of papers that were hidden under this floorboard.
I looked at the next paper and it seemed to be a birth certificate. It was yellow and almost crumbled in my hands from the wrinkles that time had brought about. I was certain it would be hers but I was thrown when I saw it was Tommy’s.
“Thomas Harold Wainright.” I closed my eyes and recited the name to the empty room almost thinking after I was done he would magically appear like a genie to grant me my wish.
Tommy was born on January 28th 1950. “Wow, you were born on my birthday.” I couldn’t believe it. How freaky was that? He was exactly 40 years older than I was. Why his birth certificate would be hidden up here was the mystery of the moment, well one of many I guess.
Right under his birth certificate were some more official type documents, among them a few passbooks from banks, an envelope from a lawyer’s office that turned out to be just an empty envelope and Tommy’s passport. I grabbed that and gave it a closer look. Stamps from France and England were on there but that was about it. He had a big smile on his face in his picture and looked to be all of about ten.
I put those aside and plucked out the few remaining items buried under the floor. I actually got excited when I saw another letter. This one looked a lot longer and hopefully gave a little more information than the last one did.
I’ve decided to hide my things here. No one knows this room even exists except for me and Tommy. I all but begged my brother not to tell anyone about it, I told him I’d clean his room for a month. Anyway, I know this is the only place left in the world where I can actually be me. As sad as that sounds, I just can’t let out my feelings anywhere else. I need to find a good hiding place for my diary because no matter where I put it, stupid Beth always finds it and reads what I have to say. That’s so unfair because I would never do that to her! Doesn’t she know that with my life as public as it is, my diary is the only place I can be myself all by myself?
That’s why I am so grateful that Tommy and I accidentally found this room when we were wrestling right outside his closet. If he hadn’t thrown me into his closet with so much force that I hit the wall, I would have never found this place. I call it destiny. I think I’m going to put my old mattress up here. I’m sure no one will even notice it’s missing from the attic and Tommy can help. Now that things are getting bad, I don’t like hearing the arguing. Tommy and I can come up here and escape from it all.
This is so exciting! I’m going to go get my diary right now and put it up here. It’s under my bed at the moment and I’m sure that Beth is probably reading it right now! I put a little note in there for her though, HA! God, I hate her sometimes!
She was much younger in this letter than she was in the last one. There was an innocence about the way it was written. I realized the diary she was talking about was the one that I had found under her bed. She did write a little note to her sister in there. There had to be more though, that couldn’t be it. The diary I found didn’t need a key at all. I took a deep breath and sighed, disappointed that there wasn’t anymore hidden that I could read through. If no one knew this room existed, why did she feel the need to hide these papers? She could have just left them in the open.
Standing up I stomped some more along the floor, hoping to find another loose board that held more answers. “What’s with all the stomping up there?” AJ called from the closet.
“I’m trying to find a loose board.”
“Oh, I thought maybe you had fallen and couldn’t get up or something.” I laughed at him as he made his way up the creaky stairs. “Wow, this is kind of cool. I wish I had one of these in my house growing up.” He said as he walked in and glanced around the small, dark room.
“I know… same here.”
“Did you find anything?” He asked, looking down at the pile of papers that I had been looking through.
“Yes and no, Tommy and I have the same birthday.”
“Oh…and Tommy would be?”
“Belle’s brother!” I couldn’t believe he had to ask me that! Where has he been?
“Oh…that’s weird. The blonde kid?”
I nodded, and handed the passport over to him so he could look for himself. “He looks like he could be a happier, cuter version of you.”
“Cuter?”
“Well, yeah.”
“AJ, he’s almost 70 years old.”
“Not in this picture though and I’m impressed you were able to figure that out Carter.”
“It’s not like I had to do advanced trigonometry or anything.”
“Again, I’m impressed you know what trigonometry is.”
“Yeah, well I’m just chock full of surprises. What about you, did you find anything or did you get the creeps and have to come up here so you wouldn’t be alone?”
“I found nothing and yes, I got the creeps, you happy? This place is spooky. I can’t see Kristin living here.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it’s true, she’ll probably be like, ‘oh. Kevin you shouldn’t have…I mean it, you really shouldn’t have!” I laughed at his high pitched Kristin voice; actually that was his high pitched any generic female voice.
“Maybe you’ll be lucky and he’ll give the place to you instead.” I said, giving up hope that I’d find a loose floorboard. I had walked every inch of that room and nothing else gave way.
“Yeah, or maybe he’ll give it to you since you seem to be attached to it.”
“I’m not attached to this place, only the people who once lived here.” I said, deciding to take a seat on the floor once again. There was so little room up here that I couldn’t even stand up straight. AJ had no problem, but he is also part dwarf, Dopey and Grumpy’s secret love child.
“She thought no one knew about this room besides her and her brother so don’t you think it’s a little weird those cops were up here? And she hid this stuff. Why hide it if you know no one will find it?” I asked.
AJ shrugged at me, “Maybe she was wrong.”
“I wonder if Kevin is having any luck?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t intend to go up and find out.” AJ wiped the dust off his already dirty jeans.
“I plan on going…which means you’ll be stuck all by yourself again.” I winked at him. God this was too much fun. Seriously, I wish Brian was here, he would get such a kick out of this.
“You know what Nick? You suck donkey ass.”
“Does that mean you’ll be following me up to the attic?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s go Scooby…” I took one final look at the small room, knowing full well I’d be back to explore some more and then ventured down the creaky steps and back into Tommy’s room.
Maybe there was something hidden in this room. I mean there was an entire secret room in this room, what’s to say there wasn’t anything else hidden in plain sight? I made a mental note to myself to come back in here and check every last inch of it before we headed up to the attic to see how Kevin’s search was progressing.
I swear AJ gasped at least ten times before we even got to the top of the steps. I guess I didn’t help because I kept making gasping sounds myself behind him as he went. I’m mean, but I’m just getting him back from my long list of ‘things to get AJ back for’ that I started compiling when I was 12. Taunting AJ in a semi, creepy haunted type house will now erase the time he told me that girls liked it when guys referred to their breast as knockers and the best way to hit on a girl was to ask if you could honk them.
“What are you guys doing?” Kevin asked as we reunited.
“Just checking to see if you found anything.”
“Just some empty notebooks and some really old condensed Reader’s Digest type books.” He said pointing to the small stack he was making in the middle of the floor. “We can probably toss some of the blank journals into the trash to see if they’ll go for the bait.”
“Good idea.” I said, picking up one of the journals and flipping through the empty pages.
“Oh and Howie just called, he’s at the airport. I was thinking maybe you’d like to go pick him up.”
I looked up at Kevin. “Me?”
“Yeah, if you don’t mind, this way AJ and I can finish things up here.”
“Why can’t I go get him?” AJ asked.
“Because I’m not letting you drive my car.”
“Wait a minute, you trust Carter but you don’t trust me?”
“Yeah.”
I smiled as wide as I could at AJ who had a look of sheer disbelief on his face, “What in the world? Did we just enter some kind of weird bizzaro world that I’m unaware of?”
“I think he’s just trying to get rid of me AJ.” I said shaking my head because come on, even though it was a nice thought that he would trust me over AJ, clearly he just wanted me out of the way or something.
“More like trying to keep you out of trouble. I don’t want you overworking yourself, you are still injured.” He said pointing to where I had been stabbed and then pointing to my head. Okay I’m a walking accident, I get it.
“I’ll go get him, I’m sure he’ll be excited to see me anyway.” I said kind of happy about seeing my Howie D. I missed the little guy.
Kevin went into his pocket and tossed me his car keys. “He’s coming in on American flight 125.”
“Gotcha.”
“What airline?” Ugh I hated when he did this!
“American.”
“What’s the flight number?”
“125 and the guy’s name is Howard, right?”
“That is correct Nickolas. We’ll see you back here in a little bit and then we’ll all head to dinner.” Kevin winked and smiled at me.
“Don’t have any fun while I’m gone please!” I said, afraid that I’d miss out on some action. “And AJ try not to be eaten by any ghosts… muhahahahaha!”
“Shut the hell up!” He answered in a most loving way.
I bounced down the stairs, suddenly finding myself in a very good mood. Now that he was almost here I was excited to see Howie. I know I was sad at first about him coming but now I am looking forward to it.
When I got in the car and adjusted everything, I realized I still had the empty notebook in my hands. I was about to put it down when I noticed something in the top right hand corner of the cover. The tiniest little 13 you could find. Seriously it was so small it could have been mistaken for the black inkblots which made up most of the cover’s surface.
“Thirteen again.” I said to myself, putting on Kevin’s overhead light and taking a closer look.
I couldn’t believe I didn’t notice it the first time I flipped through the pages but at the top corner of each page when flipped, almost formed one of those mini cartoons you could make by slightly changing the position of the drawing with each page. The only difference was, this wasn’t a drawing, these were words. Once again so small they were hard to make out. “I’m going to need to buy a magnifying glass.” I said out loud.
Luckily I knew where to get me one of those. At the airport of course! So I looked at the directions Kevin left for me, shut off the light and headed out to the airport.
I sat outside of Delta like I was supposed to, but still no Howie D in sight. “God where the hell is he?” I said, tapping my fingers on the steering wheel impatiently. I was just about to call Kevin when Howie called me.
“Where are you Nicky?” He sounded grumpy. Great…grumpy D. I guess I won’t be able to give him a nice hello licking then.
“I’m sitting outside waiting for you!”
“I’m outside and I don’t see you.”
“You are?” I got out of the car and searched the front entrance and there was no Howie D anywhere, but there was someone else. I felt my heart give an extra thump when I saw her, the policewoman who had knocked me out at Kevin’s house. She was sitting in a van a few cars away from mine.
“Nicky yes I am! I am at American’s terminal just waiting for you!”
“Oh….Shit that’s right, American!”
“Kevin knew you went to the wrong place!” He said, but I was only half listening. I wasn’t sure what exactly I should do.
“Uh…yeah…my bad. Hey D, will you do me a favor?”
“What?”
“Will you go into the gift shop and buy me a magnifying glass.”
“What?”
“A magnifying glass, a small one.”
“Why?”
“Just do it, please? I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
“Okay, fine!” He said hanging up on me and sounding more confused than ever. Poor Howie, he probably wanted to turn around and go back home.
I tried my best to not make it look like I saw her, afraid that if I did she might make her move on me. So, I just gradually got back into the car and left the terminal, looking for the American one and sure enough a few seconds after I took off, she started her car and followed me.
“Great…” I said to myself as I tried my best to lose her, weaving around the terminals, going from one to the other.
When I finally reached the correct one, Howie was standing outside and not looking very pleased. “Hey, sorry about that.” I said as I got out and grabbed his bags, throwing them in the car and looking around to see if I still had my tail.
“Is there a problem?” He asked me when he saw how distracted I was.
“Kind of, we should go.” I said, as he got into the car.
“What do you mean, kind of?”
I saw her appear in my rear view mirror again, “I mean you should buckle your seatbelt, we might be in for a bumpy ride.” I said as I stepped on the gas and high tailed it out of the parking lot, being followed close behind.
