One Call Away

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Rock Bottom

Resting her hands against the top of her coffin, Caitlyn let out a shaky breath as she tried to calm her nerves; her hands trembled and she closed her eyes resting her head back against the hard plastic that she was laying on. 

Out of all the ways that someone might have considered that they would die, this had certainly not been on the list and she guessed there could be worse ways to go but right now she could not think of any. 

It was not like she had often found herself picturing how she was die, she like many had assumed that she would die in her sleep or in old age surrounded by her loved ones. 

Caitlyn squeezed her eyes shut to stop the tears from falling, she had accepted her fate as much as she could; she did not believe for a moment that anyone would find her. 

Surely if they were even searching for her, then they would have found her by now and would have rescued her by now; she would be safe instead of trapped in what would now be her final resting place. 

Taking a few steadying breaths, she reached for the tape recorder that Edward had buried with her; his taunting message playing again as her finger hit the play button and she stared up at the ceiling resolute in her decision. 

Pressing the rewind button on the tape recorder, Caitlyn tried to think about what she wanted to say, what her final message would be for the person that found her one day.

Her finger lingered on the record button for another moment before she slowly pressed it, letting go of the nerves that she felt knowing that this would be her final act. 

"My name is Caitlyn Jones, I was born January 30th, 1989 in New York City," she began resting her head near the recorder as she held it near her ear, she stared into the darkness that surrounded her. 

Slowly she started to tell her story of how she came to find herself here, in what was highly likely going to be her final resting place; she told the story about how her life fell a part and her move to Chicago. 

How her crazy biological father had slowly ruined her life, he had murdered the only man that she could ever really call her father, shot the man that she had loved, kidnapped her, murdered her mother before her eyes and had buried her alive in this box. 

A single tear trailed down her cheek, she closed her eyes trying to imagine a world where Edward had not come back into her life and ruined everything; she imagined that she could have been happy with Jay, maybe they would have gotten married and had a couple of kids. 

Gotten a house somewhere in the suburbs, she might have opened her own bakery, the barbeques that they would have had in the summer and she had little doubt that they would have lived long happy lives. 

The sound of the fan that was circulating air around the coffin, struggling to complete its rotations, and slowing down with every turn that it made was a reminder why she had reached the decision that she had. 

"If you find my body, I would like to be cremated. I spent my last hours trapped in a box. I don't want to be buried in one again," Caitlyn said, her last request that she hoped would be listened to whenever they found her if she was ever even found at all. 

Placing the tape recorder next to her, Caitlyn steeled herself as she reached for the handgun that Edward had placed in the coffin with her. 

Turning the gun over in her hands, Caitlyn held it tightly in her hands knowing that she was going to end things her way; she was going to rob Edward of the pleasure of knowing that she had died of suffocation. 

The metal was cold in her hands and the tears started to really fall at what she was about to do, she slowly raised the gun and pressed the nozzle against the side of her head.