by Craig Rodgers
It costs next to nothing. Who would believe, a little old thing. A cabin, some would call it. A fall down, others. This home cobbled so long ago.
He parks out front and just looks. Takes it in. The driveway is broken rock grown over. A reaching arc through the long yard. The once great paved expanse has succumbed to what may come. He steps out among the sprouts and cracks.
Beyond acres away. Farmland once. Now grains shift and lean after long generations. Remains sit somewhere out there. A chimney rising in the grass. Ancient bricks stacked.
He calls the realtor, it rings and rings. He texts. Where are you, why aren’t you here. More of this. He tucks the phone away.
A dark waits. These first rooms. The walls are caved in places. Rotted all through. He touches, he knocks. Stepping deeper. He turns a knob and a flashlight pops and the dark falls back. He proceeds. Through rooms. On. Dust and flaking. In places falling. All these years.
He talks to himself. Little things, words. Wow or oh. Sometimes phrases. Oh wow. Touching these old walls. He runs a hand along.
Stairs go down. A basement wide and deep, dug beyond the walls above. Old pillars brace against the weight of stone and the world. The floor goes off into the dark. Concrete in places, dirt in others. He pulls at his shirt. A deeper heat here. In the walls, in the ground. Nooks are packed with shelves now empty, dust caked along.
He walks with the phone shined around. Pale flash lens. A rug is green with mold. Old chairs sit rotting. He touches items as if to be assured they are there.
A pair of boards are nailed over damage. Planks warped by years of rain dripping. He gives one a tug and it groans and pulls loose. He yanks the other and it snaps and falls at his feet.
A void exists beyond. He squats and leans and he shines the light. A hole is dug into the earth. A black reaching down. The light won’t touch the bottom, its glow snatched up along the way.
He stands on the basement stairs. He dials and calls and when it doesn’t connect he calls again. He climbs two steps and tries again but nothing changes. He curses aloud.
Down again. Past the stairs and on. He shines the light and he moves close and leans but he does not understand. The hole is still there but the boards are gone.
When he reaches in he feels a step. Some sort of rung. He dangles a foot and he turns and lowers himself in and another step matches the first. A crude ladder going down and down. He climbs hand over hand deep into the sunk shaft, phone light put away now, his being swallowed whole by the hot earth.
He doesn’t think to count. It doesn’t occur to him that it could be so far. When sweat runs into his eyes he wipes away its sting. When his arms begin to shake he tells himself it can’t be far now.
Still he’s shocked when the ground is there. He’d started to think the climb might go on forever. Now he stands flat on dirt floor. He turns and turns. There is a light. A trickle of gleam waving in the far off black. He goes that way, there is no other way to go.
At times he must stoop. Sometimes he touches walls for support. Making his way along. Sweating. More a cave than a hall. The light comes nearer as he moves along but it never seems to grow brighter. He calls out with a hollow want. Hello. Hello. He goes on.
The way ends as it must. A room is there, carved into the ancient stone. A single candle sits on a table, its flicker of flame stirring in a touch of air faint and puzzling. Beyond this there is a man. Bearded and skeletal. Flesh pulls thin across bones with every movement. With long fingers he bends wood and he snaps a piece and this he tosses into a hearth and then he reaches to break apart another.
A step or maybe something more subtle. Maybe just a feeling. But now he is turning, this frail figure. He is straightening as he turns to face this man. His voice is a whisper.
“Oh there you are,” he says.
_____
The realtor steps through the house. Her suit is fine but reserved. No need for pomp in the sticks. She scrolls the phone and calls again. One foot kicks a bucket away.
It rings. Of course it rings. Forever it does. She tucks the phone away. Now she wanders. Through dark rooms and around. The stairs are there leading down.
Her flashlight is military grade. It splashes the basement in daylight bright. Mud bugs curl into shadow. With a loafer she sifts among refuse. The leavings of a century of squatters. In one corner a molding rug has been dragged into a bunch.
She climbs steps back into the light. Phone held high like a trophy. She steps out of the basement and then out of the remains of the structure and she scrolls and calls again, turning and turning still. The phone clicks and the signal connects and now it rings and rings and in time the call goes nowhere. She thinks she might call again but she does not. She puts away the phone and now only stands, eyes falling closed for seconds at a time, feeling the soft presence of air on skin. Not a breeze, something gentler, more slight. She breathes in. Abrasive morning air. She takes it in deep gulps. She smiles, eyes closed. Maybe she laughs, it’s such a morning.
There is a faint air. Just a hint. In that morning freshness only the barest waft of something other does come. Smoke. She opens her eyes. She turns and turns and far off in a spread of open field there stands a chimney ancient and crumbling, some remnant of a once grand estate centuries lost, and from this relic there now trickles gray plume. She takes a step that way and then another, but she finds herself slowing, halting, and now she is sitting in the grass, now she is but an observer as the furnace is ignited once more.
Craig Rodgers is the author of several books, dozens of stories, countless notes, and one convoluted plan to fake his own death.
