Slender

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-two

The room was spinning. My ears were ringing and I couldn’t breathe out of my nose. I gasped for air and sat up. I felt congested and tired beyond belief as if I had spent all night in a non-ventilated room with a smoker and drank a bottle of Nyquil. My pores felt tight and dirty. I just wanted a shower and something to drink. Where was I? My memories were fuzzy as I tried to piece together what I last remembered.

The car, the drive, the park, Declan… Where was Declan? Better question; where was Micah? The tracks, we were looking for something, a tunnel? The tunnel. That’s the last thing I remember. We were not alone in the tunnel.

“Micah!” I shouted. I felt a hand cup my mouth and I struggled and screamed into it. I felt a gentle hand rub up and down my arm and shook it off. I elbowed my kidnapper in the ribs and looked around for anything. It was dark. I took out my phone but it was dead. I had charged it, I swear! I started to run with careful footing across the unfamiliar dark room.

“Cece, it’s me!” My kidnapper hissed. Micah.

“Damn it, you scared me shitless, what the hell!” I exclaimed in a whisper.

“Get down and come back over here.” Micah told me guiding me with his voice. I walked carefully over to his boyish voice.

“Where are we?” I asked gulping down my fear.

“We’re under a bridge.” He replied. So this wasn’t a room. It was just a concrete walled and floored tunnel under a bridge.

“What bridge?” I asked.

“It’s down the rail road a bit. I don’t know how we got here. My phone’s dead. I have no clue where Declan is.” Micah explained to me.

“Mine is too.” I croaked. My throat felt so dry.

“Do you still have your radiation detector?” He asked me. I felt him turn to look at me as his shoulder brushed against mine in the darkness.

“No. Do you?” I asked.

“No, we must have dropped them. Damn it. Those were expensive. I’ll go back and look for them later.” He told me. I nodded but I don’t think he could see me.

“What time do you think it is?” I asked.

“Some time during the night slash early morning.” Micah replied.

“Do you think it’s past one?” I worriedly asked. Our ride, oh my gosh I’m going to be in so much trouble if it’s gone or worse if the cops were called for a missing persons report. He shrugged. How could he just be so nonchalant about all of this? I mean I know that was Micah, but I thought maybe in reality it’d be different if we came across something. “What do we do?” I gulped.

“Leave.” He replied getting up. He extended his hand to me in the darkness. I grabbed it and pulled myself up from the hard concrete floor.

“Do you still have your backpack?” I couldn’t tell if he did or not.

“Yes.” He replied. I stood still waiting for him to open it and do something.

“None of my tech works. This is the closest encounter I’ve had.” He told me walking ahead of me and grabbing my hand as he passed me by. I wrapped my fingers in his bony grasp again all too familiarly. My shoes squelched as I walked. They were still wet from trudging through the creek earlier. My pants were wet too; wetter than before and higher up. We must have trudged through higher water to get here. I shivered. All I had was a hoodie in the October cold air. I was cold, wet, scared, and miserable. When we got off the concrete flooring of underneath the bridge I realized what we had walked through or been drug through. The water was a lot higher here as I plopped down into it. I let out a sharp gasp and let my free hand wrap around myself in attempt for warmth. Micah pulled my up the side of the bank and let go of my hand. I watched him climb up the steep slope of gravel that led up to the tracks. The light of the moon was the only light out here. I was terrified. I felt watched. The trees seemed to know everything and I seemed so small in this moment. I grappled the slope and rocks slid down but I pushed on. I found a concrete bar and grabbed onto that and fit my whole tiny body onto it in frog crouch position. Micah was only about nine feet above me now. He extended his arms to me.