Fetch: A psychological horror short story

Chapter 1

Martin bought it at a foreclosure auction a week before he vanished. He’d spent his life in the suburbs and the city, and when he proposed to Morey, who had grown up in a rural area, they agreed their first home would be a farmhouse.

His older brother John was a house flipper and had gotten word of the property early from his contact at the courthouse. It had taken some resolve to overcome his urge to keep it to himself, he told Martin. “If it weren’t for Morey, I definitely wouldn’t be doing this.”

Martin was eager to see the property, sure that John was overselling, as he was known to do, but then John did something he didn’t often do with Martin — he was emotionally sincere. “I’m proud of you, Marty.”

They sat in silence together. Martin’s eyes welled up.

“Better not screw this up,” John said, shaving the moment to a more familiar level. He meant with Morey, and Martin understood.

***

The following morning, a chilly spring Tuesday, Martin met John at the county courthouse. He had researched the auction process and gotten pre-approved for a hard money loan up to two hundred thousand dollars with a promise of seventy thousand down, which he would take from his 401(k), just in case.

John had gotten there forty-five minutes early to beat a crowd he predicted would be bigger than usual, and when Martin arrived at nine-forty-one, John apologized; there were a couple dozen challengers, and John recognized a few of them, including Brendan, a “big-shot finance asshole” that he said only shows up to buy.

“I’ll keep my eye out, Marty,” he said.

“Show me the pictures, John,” Martin said.

John sighed, and Martin turned to face him and extended an upturned hand toward him. John unlocked his phone and handed it over.

Martin swiped through the gallery. It was a classic, symmetrical two-story farmhouse with three red brick steps leading to a fenced porch that ran its width. A wind chime hung from the porch ceiling near one of its six supporting columns, and there was a roof turbine on top of the house where one might expect a rooster weathervane. The grass was still short from its last fall cut, only having just awoken from its long winter hibernation. “God, dude, this is incredible,” he said.

“I knew you’d like it,” John said.

“I love it,” Martin said. “So what’s the issue?”

John pointed at Brendan. “See that douche right there?”

Martin saw.

“A great flip is twenty percent gross profit,” John said. “Thirty percent is an incredible flip. He doesn’t bother unless he thinks he can do thirty. That he’s here at all means he probably knows something we don’t — someone probably showed him interior pics. He’s got county people, and not like my county contact. He pays them.”

“That’s a good thing, then,” Martin said, “isn’t it? Like it’s not a trash-heap inside.”

“It means you’re bidding with fractions.”

“What’s a winning bid on a house like this look like, usually?”

“I don’t know. With an interior as nice as the exterior, it’d probably go to market for two thirty, maybe two fifty. If the basement’s finished, maybe two seventy. General rule is try to stay below seventy percent of what you think you can sell it for so you’ve still got margin after renovations. So, shit, I don’t know, one sixty, one seventy-five.”

“What’s the best flip you’ve ever done?” Martin asked. “Margin.”

“Marty,” John said, knowing what Martin was about to do.

“What is it?” Martin said.

“Fifty, once,” John said. “And it took the convergence of luck and fate, maybe a blood sacrifice, but I won’t confirm that.”

“So if he doesn’t bother unless he thinks he can do thirty percent, and he’s a big deal, and your best flip was fifty, then assuming he knows something we don’t — assuming the interior’s as nice as the exterior and the basement’s finished — he probably won’t go over one eighty-seven.”

Martin did this often — he’d gather information, silently forming a plan of attack in the background, and spring a trap with it to bury his point or win an argument. John had told him many times he’d have made a ton of money as a lawyer, but Martin never replied with words, only a grin and a shake of his head. Martin would never have said it aloud, but he was too nice to be a lawyer, and he wasn’t a profit hog like John. Martin just floated along, content to be really good at nothing special — he was a contracts auditor — happy being happy.

“One eighty-seven is really high, Marty,” John said. “Houses with nice interiors and finished basements don’t go to foreclosure auctions often, and if it’s not a slam-dunk, it’s gonna need renovations.”

“It wouldn’t be an investment to me, John,” Martin said.

When bidding opened, Brendan scared everyone off groaning and cursing with a starting number of one eighty, and Martin made an enemy of Brendan with a counter of two hundred thousand. Brendan and John both gave Martin the same dismayed look, and Martin noticed but kept cool like a statue, gravely serious.

“Two ten,” Brendan said, raising his right hand barely above his shoulder and then returning it to his pocket and glaring at Martin.

John leaned toward Martin and whispered, “Let it go, there are always others.”

“Two fifty,” Martin said.

John glared at Martin with an open mouth.

“What are you getting yourself into, John?” Brendan said. He shook his head and made a phone call.

“What are you doing?” John said to Martin. “How the fuck are you gonna pay for this?”

Brendan pulled the phone away from his ear. “If he can’t pay, that’s the end of your career, John.”

John ignored him.

“Gimme thirty, John, I have the rest,” Martin said.

“Or you can let me have it,” Brendan said.

“Fuck off, Brendan,” John said, then he said to Martin, “I don’t fucking have thirty grand sitting around, Marty. Jesus.”

Martin arched an eyebrow at him. Brendan watched.

“Dude, this is my job,” John said, “the cash I keep is for buying — so I can make money … for a living.”

“Imagine I’m Morey asking,” Martin said.

John shook his head.

“I’m sorry,” Martin said. “It’s exactly what we’ve wanted, and I’ll pay you back as soon as I can. You were right that I’d love it. I can see our future here. I can see your nephews running around.”

John hid his face in his hand.

“We didn’t get it,” Brendan said into the phone. “I’ll tell you later,” then he hung up.

John lent Martin the money and Martin withdrew from his brokerage account to cover the difference, and the sale was made. Martin took the keys and they went straight to the house, a twenty-five-minute drive into the county’s farthest, most secluded corner, off a miles-long, one-car-wide dirt road with a one-word name — Essen.

***

On the porch, John closed his eyes and inhaled a breath, like a final prayer, then unlocked the front door.

Inside, the home was furnished as fully and homely as an operating bed and breakfast and as neat as if it had been staged that very morning. A layer of dust had blanketed everything in a faint opaque, dulling the saturated browns of the natural hardwood floors and craftsman furniture and catching the high noon windowlight on its floating flakes, speckling the air with a bright, sporadic shimmer.

John wheezed. “Holy shit, man!” He started laughing and Martin started laughing, and they hugged each other, laughing together like idiots. “I’ve never seen anything like this from an auction. This is like hitting a jackpot.”

“Like buying a jackpot,” Martin said.

“You certainly earned it,” John said. “No flipper would have been crazy enough to bid two fifty.”

“I’m not a flipper,” Martin said.

“When you show Morey, don’t forget to let her know how you found it,” John said.

Martin grinned. “Why was this foreclosed?”

John shrugged. “The owners just moved and left it here is what I heard, stopped making payments. Sudden financial hardship, running from a warrant, who gives a shit.”

Martin and John walked room to room together, and with each stop their eyes opened wider, their cheeks pinched higher, their jaws dropped lower. They could not believe Martin’s good fortune. Save for a creak in the upstairs hallway, which John said added character, it was perfect. Nothing they saw looked cheap or neglected — the floors unscuffed, windows and mirrors clear, drains unstained by limescale — it had been cherished by its previous owners.

An unsettled feeling came over Martin as that evidence accumulated, at that inarguable realization, how baffling it was that despite their apparent care, they’d just leave and not take anything with them.

“Oh, let’s check out the basement,” John said as he reached the bottom of the staircase. He indicated a door opposite the stairs, in the hallway between the foyer and kitchen. He grabbed the pentagonal glass knob but it did not move when he tried to twist it. He reached above the head jamb for a key to match the beaded backplate’s keyhole, but none was there. He tried the knob again, this time joggling it, but it didn’t budge.

“That’s weird, right?” Martin said.

John stepped back and scanned the area. “Nah. They might have had a small kid they didn’t want opening the door and falling down the stairs. It’s normal.”

“Is it normal for people with young kids to leave their house and not take anything?” Martin said.

“Well, no,” John said. “Who knows why people do what they do? And who cares, in this case? — this fell into your lap! Good luck is usually preceded by some bad luck, that’s just how things go. But their bad luck isn’t your concern. Don’t think about that stuff, man, be grateful.”

“Yeah,” Martin said.

“Yeah,” John said with sarcastic emphasis. “Let me know when you find the key, alright?”

Chapter 2

“A dessert this evening, sir and madam?” asked the maître d’, a middle-aged gentleman named Jerome with a tightly-groomed beard and waxed Poirot mustache.

Martin and Morey shared a brief glance, and Martin said to Jerome, “We’ll have one of each, please. Special occasion.” Martin again glanced at Morey, this time with a coy grin, and she beamed back at him, shocked and infatuated by his unusual extravagance.

After dinner, he opened the passenger door of his well-maintained 2003 Toyota crossover for her, gold-stenciled bag of boxed leftovers in his other hand, and said he had a surprise to show her — a bit of a drive, but she wouldn’t be disappointed. Martin had always been sweet to her and conscientious, but he wasn’t especially romantic; this evening, her thirty-second birthday, he was something like a new man, aglow with an excitement she’d never before seen in him. She was in love all over again.

He turned onto Essen, then a minute later into the driveway, and she asked whose house it was, genuinely confused. He smiled at her and grabbed her hand, and she understood and cried. She pulled him toward her by his hand and kissed him softly, then turned off the ignition and climbed over the center console onto him and kissed him more slowly.

“Do you have the keys?” she whispered into his ear.

He nodded. “Do you want to see it?”

She nodded back.

They had sex on the foyer’s hardwood floor, and then he showed her every room on the main and upper level. There’s a basement, too, he told her, he just needs to find the key.

***

That Saturday, after five grueling trips back and forth that took them from predawn to evening, they were moved in, and their five-year-old Parson Russell Terrier named Monte, fifteen pounds of exuberance, explored the home eagerly.

John told his brother the money he’d lent him was the best investment of his career because he could see how happy he and Morey were, and then he repeated himself a couple trips later in earshot of Morey, who hugged and thanked him. Martin rolled his eyes and John winked at him.

“Did you check out the basement yet?” John asked.

“I haven’t really looked for the key yet,” Martin said. “I’ll do it tonight now that we’re moved in.”

“Text me, and don’t forget,” John said, and Martin nodded.

***

Martin went for carryout, and on his way home, he continued past his driveway down Essen, straight into the sunset, feeling unburdened, happy, and curious. He drove for ten minutes through endless fallow fields before he turned around, and halfway back he slowed at the only sign of neighbors he’d seen along the way — a large swing gate, painted black, guarding a nearly-invisible opening at the mouth of the woods about fifty yards from the road. No sign, no path, just parallel lines of trampled grass leading into the trees. He continued home.

Martin and Morey ate noodles on the couch, arm to arm, passively watching a home reno reality show. Monte whimpered and Martin offered him a piece of beef between extended chopsticks, earning a displeased look from Morey. Afterward, Martin went through the kitchen drawers and cupboards looking for the basement door key, to no avail.

“Maybe it’s above the fridge,” Morey said from the couch. “Somewhere a kid couldn’t reach it.”

Martin felt above the fridge. Nothing but dust. He wiped his hand on his shirt, and then left the kitchen and began digging through a box behind the couch. Morey lurched over the back cushion to watch.

Martin held up a screwdriver and smiled at her.

He removed the oval rosette from the basement door, then the bronze backplate, then the knob.

“Alright, let’s see what we got,” he said. He opened the door and flipped the switch, but the lights were out. A waft of must hit him like a spirit fleeing a tomb. “Of course the lights are out.”

“Here,” Morey said, handing him her phone, flashlight on, then sheepishly peering over his shoulder.

He pointed the flashlight into the dark, casting a wide but shallow cone of white light that reached only halfway down the rickety wooden staircase.

He and Morey stood for a moment, tense, something like an animal instinct.

Monte rushed past their legs and down the stairs, swallowed by the black. Martin followed, Morey close behind, until they reached the cement floor. Monte sniffed in one direction, then in the opposite direction, then stood, staring, his back and ears erect and still, something like an animal instinct.

Martin aimed the light in the direction of Monte’s stare, but it only illuminated darkness. He took a few steps forward.

A steel door, so black in the dark it looked like a void.

Martin approached, focused the light on the door’s center, then traced it along the door’s edges, then back to the center. The lever handle had been removed. No — Martin tilted forward and stuck out the phone light — the handle had been sawed off; a piece of it remained in the door. He turned to Morey.

“What is this?” she said.

“A bunker door, I think,” Martin said, turning back to the door. “A bomb shelter. The lever’s broken.”

“So we can’t open it?”

Martin turned to her again. Behind her, lit by a gradient ray from the main floor hallway light, Monte was in the same spot, still staring and alert. “I don’t know,” Martin said.

“I’ll go get some bulbs,” Morey said. “From the bedrooms.”

Martin nodded and followed her to the stairs, where he sat and waited with Monte. He stroked Monte’s back. It was like petting a taxidermied mount.

Martin scanned the ceiling with the flashlight as Morey shuffled along at his back, stopping at each bulb until all five had been changed. Martin flipped the switch at the base of the staircase. The walls were cement like the floor, and there was nothing down there, totally empty, not a single shelf — only the black steel door, which Monte continued to watch.

***

“House was built in ’59,” John said through the phone. “Cold War. Bunkers were hugely popular then. Not a bad thing to have nowadays, too, but I won’t get into that. This is another stroke of luck, Marty. Instant home value add. People love ’em, even in peaceful times.”

“I’ve never seen a basement this empty,” Martin said. Martin was pragmatic and often struggled to make sense of illogical things, to accept that human behavior was rarely logical at all, and the confluence of the unexplained departure, the locked door, the empty basement, and the sawed-off bunker lever was like a scab on his intuition.

The night prior, he had slept only in brief spurts when his mind became too tired to contemplate the eeriness he felt, but that eeriness snuck into his dreams and conjured nightmares, waking him and creating a cycle. His temples throbbed.

“Probably flooded and they cleared it out, got rid of what was down there,” John said.

“But the handle — ”

“Is this because you feel bad about how well it worked out for you?” John said. “Like, you think you gotta downplay it?”

“No,” Martin said. “I don’t know, the vibes are just weird.”

“You’re not a vibes guy,” John said dismissively. “And man you’d shit yourself at some of the stuff I’ve found in foreclosures, stuff you can’t even process because you never would have imagined you’d see it in a person’s house. You’re whining about normal stuff, man.”

“I’m not whining, I’m just — ”

“You’re whining, Marty, and it’s annoying. I’ve got a metal guy who does welding work for me — Stieg — made a door frame for one of my properties. See about him making a new handle for the bunker. Here, one sec … I just sent you his contact. Call him, alright? And you really should stop whining, buddy, nobody likes a sore winner. Getting a call, I gotta go, talk to you later.”

Martin hung up. John was right, he thought. He called Stieg.

Chapter 3

Stieg’s shop was a converted warehouse without a proper entry door or any signage suggesting a business. Through the open bay door, Martin saw two men with welding helmets, one of whom was torching steel with a blue flame, sparks flying like fireworks from the white-hot contact point. The other was standing against a stomach-high table shuffling through papers with his facemask flipped up.

Martin stepped into the bay. “Are you Stieg?” he asked the man at the table.

The man turned to Martin and then jerked his head toward the other man, causing his facemask to fall down. He threw his head back and his facemask flipped back up.

Stieg came over to the table, pushed his facemask up, and took off his bulky brown gloves and set them on the table. He reached out a huge, blackened hand. “Marty?”

Martin shook his hand. “Martin, yeah.”

“John said you’ve got some kind of haunted door that’s locked shut and you need a new handle,” Stieg said in a flat baritone. Stieg was tall — his chin about Martin’s eye level — and not thin, had a square face with unwieldy black naturally-furrowed eyebrows and thick facial stubble that would look like a full beard from a distance, and sharp brown eyes that seemed a higher resolution than the world around him. Not a guy for a second of wasted time, Martin thought.

“Oh,” Martin said, caught off guard. “Well, not quite, but yes, I was hoping you could make a bunker lever for me.”

“A haunted bunker,” Stieg said, again without a hint of humor. “John undersold it, then. Unlike him.”

Martin realized the deadpan and grinned. “Can you do it?”

“Did you bring the old lever?” Stieg asked.

“The lever was broken off, or sawed off,” Martin said.

“Ah. Well I’ll need to know what type of gear attachment to put on the lever,” Stieg said.

“Part of it’s still in the door,” Martin said. “It’s stuck in the door. I was hoping you could make a lever and weld it onto the piece that’s still there so I can open it.”

“So you can let the ghosts out?” Stieg said. He didn’t smile. It was funnier this way, now that Martin was in on it.

“Yeah, I guess so,” Martin said.

“Shouldn’t be a problem,” Stieg said. “Can you make a mold?”

“I’m good with instructions,” Martin said.

“Then you can make a mold,” Stieg said. “I’m closing up shortly, but you bring it by tomorrow and I’ll make your lever.” Stieg grabbed his gloves and flipped his facemask down with a quick nod and walked back to his torch.

***

Martin bought materials for the mold at Lowe’s — silicone caulking, glycerin, mineral spirits, cornstarch, and plastic cups — and on his way back home was again drawn past his driveway by curiosity.

He drove until he saw the opening in the woods and pulled off the road and up to the black gate and got out of his vehicle. He tried to see where the path beyond the gate led, but it bent far ahead into the forest of white oaks, the pale yellow-green of their early-bloom leaves blending together into an impassable mass. He considered walking the path, but instead he left, suddenly wary of potential trespassing and averse to the risk.

***

“What the hell is that smell?” Morey said as she entered the kitchen. She recoiled and covered her nose and mouth. “It smells like someone died in here, Marty!”

“Sorry, I had no idea it would smell this bad,” he said, his left arm bent across his nose. The kitchen island was a mess of cans and cups and viscous spillage. Monte sat loyally beside Martin’s feet, hopeful for food and unbothered by the noxious odor.

“Can’t you do this in the basement?” Morey said.

“I think it’s done,” Martin said. “Sorry, I’ll clean it up in a second.” He sucked in a gulp of air, grabbed a roll of duct tape, the cup of the silicone mix, and another cup with a U-shape cut out on one side from the lip to near the base, and rushed to the basement door. “Shit, hey can you — ”

Morey opened the door and Martin started down. He turned back and called to Monte, who appeared in the doorway and immediately stiffened. “Monte, come,” Martin said. Monte scuttled backward. “Fine,” Martin said, and he continued down.

***

While the mold dried, Morey showered and Martin played fetch with Monte in the back yard, which was unfenced and faced the expansive woods. On Martin’s fifth throw, Monte retrieved the ball but stopped and stared at the woods, then darted into it. Martin gave chase, frantically calling Monte’s name, but by the time Martin had reached the tree line, Monte was out of sight.

The farther into the woods Martin penetrated, the more disoriented he became; every tree was a copy of the next or a close variation with its own copy a tree or two away, and the area was much denser than he’d have guessed from outside of it, perhaps so aflush on account of the season’s ripe blossoming. The ground, though mostly bare of flora, strangely bore no visible signs of fauna, and when Martin honed in on it in an attempt to find Monte’s tracks — or any animals’ tracks — he found none and felt more lost upon returning his gaze forward.

After what he had guessed was approximately ten minutes of fruitless tracking and directionless treading, a small building stood out among the environment up ahead, only a portion visible between layers of trees. Once nearer, it was apparent that it was a shed — sturdy-looking but with a crumbling, curling layer of yellowed white paint.

The shed’s double doors were tautly chained shut and secured with five padlocks, as if a shed in the middle of the woods wasn’t discomforting enough on its own. It had no windows, but had a skylight on each side of its butterfly roof. Martin tried briefly to climb onto the roof to look through one of the skylights, but gave up quickly and refocused on finding Monte. He stopped wasting time scanning for prints in the dirt and instead walked in a straight line, occasionally looking back to the shed for directional confirmation.

He heard indistinct sounds in the distance. Thumping and neighing.

A clearing ahead, marked by a wall of brightness flooding the trees and setting their leaves aglow. Martin nearly missed it because of the hue from the light, but there was Monte’s orange ball like a flame poking around a tree. And then he heard Monte’s cheerful yip.

Monte had slipped under a split-rail wooden fence and was running alongside a stout Quarter horse, which galloped back and forth, neighing. Its coat was a beautiful chestnut that glimmered in the sun, its mane and tail the same color, both groomed to precise, even ends. A narrow white rhombus, like a thin diamond, ran from its snout to its forehead, and all four of its legs were freckled with white spots — the forelegs up to the knee, the hind legs up to the stifle, where the thigh meets the stomach. Four other horses were watching this one and Monte frolick and approached slowly with interest. Their coats were identical.

Martin called after Monte from the fence, but Monte did not hear him.

A man, maybe forty, stepped out from the stables to Martin’s left, calmly took a read of the situation, and then hollered to Martin, with a kind tone, “This is private property, friend.” He had a weathered look to him — prominent lines in his face, deep-set eyes. Two boys — twins, looked about eight years old — excitedly ran out from the stables and stood behind the man. A third boy, a triplet, peeked his head out from inside the stables.

“I’m so sorry, my dog ran under the fence — from the woods,” Martin said. “He probably smelled the horses. He’s always been really curious.”

“These woods are private property, too,” the man said.

“Oh, I didn’t know,” Martin said. “We just bought the farmhouse over — ” Martin turned and raised his arm to point, but then wasn’t sure what direction to point in, “ — uh, on the other side of the woods somewhere. We were playing in the yard and he ran into the woods and kept going.”

The man moved his hands from his pockets to his hips and there was a silence that lasted long enough that Martin wasn’t sure if the man had heard him, and Martin’s cordial smile shriveled away.

“I guess that makes us neighbors, then,” the man finally said, borrowing Martin’s smile. “I’m Papp.”

“I’m Martin. Nice to meet you. Sorry it happened like this.” Martin smiled again to signal the joke.

“Who’s your little trespasser?” Papp said, his smile getting stale. “What’s his name?”

“Monte,” Martin said.

Monte had moved on from the horse he’d been running with and greeted the four others, who craned their necks down at him.

Martin considered asking Papp about the chained shed in the woods, but wasn’t sure how to broach it.

“Alright, well, seeing as this is private property, it’s best you and Monte head back home,” Papp said, his smile now faded into slightly curled lips. He pointed. “Straight shot that way and you’ll be there.”

Martin nodded. “Sorry again, sir, it won’t happen again.” He called Monte and this time Monte came. “Your horses are beautiful,” he said to Papp.

Papp nodded and Martin took Monte home.

Chapter 4

Monday morning, Martin called out of work. He hadn’t slept. More nightmares.

He dreamed he found the previous owners in the bunker, rotting. He could still smell them after he was jolted awake, but didn’t recall the dream or identify the smell. Later, he dreamed the door had opened to an underground river, its water black and stationary and freezing cold, and he was paralyzed on a stony bank among a group clustered together, all of them grey, their eyes sealed shut, their colorless arms reaching desperately at a helmeted figure standing at the center of them and ignoring their despaired pleas, his eyes wide open, stoic, apathetic. When Martin awoke he was shivering and damp with sweat, an incessant ringing pitch in his head, but no recollection.

***

“You’re looking fresh,” Stieg said. “Spry.”

Martin’s eyes were bloodshot with heavy bags under them, his face drained. He set the mold on the shop table. “How, um …” His eyes floated in the space between Stieg and the floor. “How fast can you make it?”

Stieg studied Martin for a moment. “Couple hours, probably.”

Martin nodded, but the movement was as if he’d let his head fall forward and then caught and relifted it. “I’ll sit over here,” he said, and began toward a chair against the wall.

Stieg followed him. “Marty, I think you should try to get some sleep.”

Martin smirked at him and nodded again, this time enthusiastically, but didn’t move.

“In your own bed, Marty,” Stieg said.

“It’s okay,” Martin said.

“Marty, get the hell out of my shop,” Stieg said. “Go home.”

Martin looked at him like he’d admitted a betrayal.

“I’ll bring it by when I’m done,” Stieg said. “I’ll bring my torch.”

Martin rose from the chair, nodded once more, and left.

***

Martin opened the door and saw nothing, the absence of everything. A place darker than black, completely devoid of light, and of feeling and warmth, of any semblance of life beyond Martin’s own. He was entirely alone in the way the dead are entirely gone; his solitude was absolute. He began to cry, and felt more helpless, and then cried louder.

A far-away hum rose from the silence, perhaps triggered by his crying, and gradually clotted. The hum never increased in volume, but as it condensed, Martin recognized the sound as the muted agony of a massive crowd, probably thousands, as if everyone was suffocating or screaming from under water. He moved in the direction he thought the hum was coming from, and then in another direction, and then he ran in another, but he never got closer to it. Despite understanding that there must be others, that there must be a source of the hum, he knew he was alone. He fell into hysteria, sobbing and heaving. “Please,” he choked out. “Please!”

And then, from deep within the hum, he heard his name. “Martin!”

“Martin!” Morey said, shaking him.

Martin opened his eyes and when he saw Morey he lunged forward and wrapped his arms around her.

“Oh my god, Marty. What’s wrong?”

Martin pulled his head away from her, still cupping her shoulders in each hand, and studied her, appreciated her. “I love you,” he said.

Morey’s face contorted, pulled at parts by gratitude, confusion, and distress. “I love you, too. Are you alright?”

“I think it was just a bad dream,” Martin said. A chill slid down his back and he crossed his arms to insulate himself.

“I mean in general,” Morey said. “You were talking in your sleep.”

“Really?” Martin said.

“Yeah, really. You were scaring me,” Morey said. “You were saying, ‘Save me, please save me.’ Do you remember why you were saying that?”

Martin tried to remember, but couldn’t. He shook his head. “I think I’ve just been stressed, haven’t been sleeping well.”

“You slept for eighteen hours,” Morey said. “It’s Tuesday morning. I was getting ready for work when I heard you.” Morey pressed her hand against Martin’s forehead, then caressed the side of his face. “No fever. Hopefully you feel better now that you’ve rested.”

Martin was stunned.

“John’s friend came by yesterday,” Morey said.

“With the lever?” Martin said.

Morey nodded. “He welded it to the bunker door. He said to give it six hours to cure. It’s been twelve.”

“Did you open the door?” Martin said.

Morey winced. “Fuck no. It gives me the creeps.”

“It gives me the creeps, too,” Martin said. “I think it’s why I’ve been having nightmares.”

“Maybe we should open it together,” Morey said. “When I get home?”

Martin looked away, measuring his nerves against his impulse and then realizing he hadn’t responded yet. “Yeah, I agree,” he said.

“Are you working today?” Morey said.

“Um. I suppose I should, yeah, now that I’ve gotten some sleep,” Martin said.

“Alright,” Morey said as she stood from the bedside. “I’ve gotta get going. Love you.”

“Love you,” Martin said.

***

Martin tried to work, but the bunker beckoned him. He took frequent breaks as a means of distraction — took Monte, leashed, to potty in the back yard twice in an hour — but the bunker beckoned him still. He could not focus.

He descended into the basement.

It took great force to turn the bunker lever, and the door was so heavy that Martin for a moment thought the lever had not worked. But it had. He shouldered the door open, its rusted hinges squealing at the friction, and after five seconds of processing what he saw, self-pity infiltrated him like ink spreading through liquid. The bunker was empty.

On Martin’s way back up, Monte peered down from the top of the stairs, ears pointed. “It’s empty,” Martin said to him.

Monte retreated.

“There’s nothing there!” Martin said, and when he reached the doorway, Monte again retreated, and Martin scooped him from the floor and stomped back down the stairs and through the open bunker door and held Monte out as if he were an offering. “See?”

Monte squirmed, and Martin put him down, expecting him to bolt for the stairs, but instead he sniffed about until he yet again stood erect and stared, this time at the wall against the far-left corner. Martin inspected it closely, and noticed in the rugged concrete finish a crack as tall as the bunker, obscured at points by clumps of rock dust. He blew at the dust and the crack became clearer, indisputable.

He gave the wall a timid one-handed push and it did not move. He stepped back and pushed hard with both hands and the wall yielded. Martin turned to Monte, who looked up at him. “Is this insane?” Martin said. Monte did not answer. Martin turned back to the wall. “This is insane.”

Martin leaned his body against the wall, and the wall rumbled as it dragged. He pulled his phone from his pocket, turned on its flashlight, and pointed it forward. “Echo!” he called out.

There was no return echo. Only damp, dark quiet. “This is insane,” he said again. And then, ignoring his rattling fear and siren-sounding judgment, Martin headed into the tunnel, and Monte followed him.

The tunnel was only three feet wide, and though Martin had several inches of space on either side of him, the combination of claustrophobia and an unknown distance and destination unsettled him to the point that he began trembling as he footed forward, his off-hand stretched outward as a shield. The walls were stacked rock, and it was apparent they had been built hastily. A rancid, sour smell caked the air, and Martin expected that he — or Monte, just ahead of him, slithering his head back and forth with his nose near the ground — would find a dead animal that had been trapped. Martin hoped it would be just an animal, and then he was instantaneously crippled by nausea and doubled over to catch his breath, and Monte stopped and turned back to him and tilted his head to the side.

Chapter 5

Martin and Monte continued down the tunnel, slowly, and Martin saw on his phone that fifteen minutes had passed. He had thought such a scenario would have bloated his sense of time by many multiples of reality, but it had done the opposite, it had eaten into it like a parasite; it had felt like merely five minutes had passed.

A single small line of fading light vertically split the darkness far ahead, like a falling eyelash. Martin’s heartbeat quickened and got heavier, then raged until his chest hurt.

He met the streak of light, which poured through a sliver in the ceiling at a 95-degree slant above the end of the tunnel. He took in a giant breath, then exhaled. He shone his phone’s flashlight at the ceiling. It was a trapdoor. He pocketed his phone and raised both hands and pushed. The thin light ray expanded momentarily, then reverted. Something heavy wobbled in place above the door.

Martin tried again, this time locking his elbows and using his legs to push, squatting slightly up and down in unison with the wobble, and then with a final burst and a grunt, he pushed hard with both his legs and arms, and the wobbling object crashed to the side with a thud. He looked down at Monte, who whimpered back. “This is insane,” Martin said.

The trapdoor flopped over with ease, catching itself on the fallen object. Martin pulled himself up through the opening and recognized immediately from the skylights overhead that he was in the chained shed in the woods.

The fallen object was a stone birdbath with a wide trunk, wrapped in a decorative, scaly spiral — broken into five pieces, the bowl still intact. The shed’s other contents were ordinary, if sparse, and none new: on one side, a stack of shovels leaned against each other in a corner, two rakes, a set of shears, and an old sun-bleached coiled hose; and on the other side, dozens of chalky bags of gravel piled without order, all unopened but some gashed with their guts spilled onto the ground.

Martin attempted to put the birdbath back together. If he could piece together the trunk, he thought, and lay the bowl on top, perhaps he’d be helped by the binding power of gravity.

As he assembled the pieces, the spiral revealed itself, and though it meant nothing more than it had before, it relit his nerves: the spiral was a snake, neatly woven around the trunk like the knot of a noose, its neck and tail breaking the pattern at either end and meeting at the gaping fanged mouth in the trunk’s center — an ouroboros. Martin decided, this time aloud to himself, that it meant nothing, and pulled his hand away from the trunk, which toppled. He returned to the tunnel, to Monte, and closed the hatch.

***

Martin called John and told him about the tunnel and the shed and Papp and the ranch.

“Residential escape tunnels weren’t common,” John said, “but only because they were expensive, took a long time to dig, and required expanded land ownership and local permits to build. Basically just a pain in the ass.”

“Could someone dig their own tunnel, you think — without all that?” Martin asked.

“I guess, if he was a lunatic,” John said. “But given the tunnel exists, whoever built it probably went through the steps. Maybe tunnels were easier back when the house was built.”

“Is it something we can look up — like in public records or something?” Martin said.

“Why, Marty?” John said. “So you can confirm a phantom theory or create a new one? I don’t get why you’ve been so paranoid lately. I’m surprised you haven’t argued yourself into getting over it by now.”

Martin sighed, trying to purge his shame. “I know. I don’t get it either. I think … big life event, maybe, you know? I don’t know. Thanks for talking reason into me, and sorry for all this shit.”

“Look, you don’t need to apologize,” John said. “I’m sorry, too — for being crass about it. I’ve forgotten how stressful it is to move, desensitized to it, I guess.”

Martin was silent.

“Marty? You there?” John said.

“Uh, yeah, sorry,” Martin said. “Can you just do me one more favor? I’m not being paranoid, I’m just curious — can you check out that ranch? Like, I don’t know — ”

“That it’s registered?” John said. “That it’s supposed to be there? That it’s not a covert ranch hidden in the woods, protected by the government?”

“I think I hallucinated that you apologized for being crass like one minute ago,” Martin said, “fucking weird, god, maybe it’s a neural problem. Maybe I have a brain tumor. Fuck, what am I gonna say to Morey — ”

“Marty, shut up,” John said, “it was a joke, you little baby. I’ll look into it.”

“Thank you, John,” Martin said with an exaggerated drawl.

“Call ya later, dickhead,” John said, and hung up.

***

When Morey got home a little after four p.m., she asked Martin if he wanted to open the bunker door. He meagerly admitted that he had already opened it — he couldn’t focus, he kept thinking about it (she said she had done the same at her job) — but lied and told her it was empty, embarrassed that he’d gotten so worked up about it. She said, “Oh …” with a tinge of disappointment, but then started to laugh and told Martin that all day she had worried that they’d find something awful in it, and that she was relieved that he’d opened it already.

***

Spring winds wailed against the house, whipping the chime about and spinning the turbine so it whistled, and the house talked back, moaning and popping and clanking as its wood, pipes, and metal adjusted. Martin and Morey were huddled together on the couch, and Monte next to Martin, watching empty nesters shop for retirement homes in Hawaii. A buffer wheel repeatedly interjected.

Martin’s phone buzzed on the arm of the couch.

“Oh, it’s John,” he said, grabbing it. “I asked him to give me a call.”

“No problem, I think I’ll go to bed anyway,” Morey said. “We can finish this episode tomorrow night.”

Martin nodded as he answered the phone, and Morey headed upstairs. Monte stayed.

“I looked into the ranch,” John said. “Registered residence and business. Generational, only three owners, all Fischers. Ott, his son Alwin, Alwin’s son Phaun — I’m guessing that’s Papp. You heard of Fischer Stables?”

“No, should that ring a bell?” Martin said.

The ceiling above Martin creaked as Morey walked over it.

“I don’t know, I hadn’t heard of it either,” John said. “Apparently they breed prize-winning horses. Nationally renowned, been breeding since the fifties.”

“The fifties?” Martin said.

“Yeah, the residence was registered in ’47 to Ott Fischer, who founded Fischer Stables sometime in 1951,” John said. “And check this out … In 1985, the Reagan administration pushed through a law for a POW Medal — that was in November — and that December, the US Air Force retroactively awarded an Ott Fischer. He was in the Eighth Air Force in World War II — dude was dropping bombs on German industrial sites with Allied squads in ’45 and was shot down. And lived. And then was taken prisoner. And then escaped, came home, built a fucking house here, and started breeding horses, started a horse-breeding empire.”

“Jesus Christ,” Martin said.

“Yeah, fuckin’ Jesus Christ, man, he was a goddamn badass,” John said. “And I’m flippin’ houses. It’s actually pretty funny.”

“What’s funny?” Martin said.

“How fucking normal our lives are,” John said. “Puts things in perspective real fast.”

“Yeah,” Martin said in his dry way when his thoughts got caught on something.

“So the secretiveness makes sense,” John said. “You’re a badass war vet, you come home, want to start a new life, want privacy. And maybe you love horses. And by now, they probably got some special shit they’re feedin’ ’em or something like that, whatever, but it makes sense they don’t want people sneaking up on their matters, especially a dumb new neighbor.”

“Monte ran into the woods, what was I supposed to do?” Martin said.

“I’m teasing you, Marty,” John said. “You can relax now. You’ve gotten all your explanations and even a nice little bit of perspective. I don’t think you’d survive war capture. No offense.”

Martin grinned to himself. “I definitely would not. Thanks for looking into it for me — and for the perspective.”

“Alright, man, I’ll talk to you later,” John said.

“Later,” Martin said.

***

Martin took Monte out to potty and then they joined Morey in the bedroom. Martin fell asleep quickly.

He dreamed that he owned a horse ranch like Fischer Stables, and that he had beautiful horses like theirs, and that he had triplet sons like Papp, and he and Morey watched their sons and Monte run alongside their horses in a vast open field at sunset. In the dream, he turned to Morey and told her he loved her, and she smiled back and said, “Save me, please save me,” and he smiled and nodded at her and then continued watching their sons in the field. And then Morey grabbed his forearm tight, and her hand was wet and cold, freezing cold as if a hand of ice, and — 

Martin woke up in a jolt. He remembered this dream. He rubbed his forearm. It wasn’t cold, but he could feel the tingly sensation of blood returning to where Morey’s hand had gripped it in the dream. He sat up.

Monte was standing stiff and alert at the closed bedroom door.

The wind hadn’t let up, and the house’s rebuttals hadn’t either.

Martin got out of bed and walked over to Monte and knelt beside him. “It’s just a windstorm, buddy,” Martin said.

Then Martin heard a bang from the bowels of the house. He was not sure if it was just another pipe expanding or if it was something else, but his nerves flared again, his mind set loose again. He turned his head so that his ear was perpendicular to the door, and he was still, something like an animal instinct.

He listened. The wind howled. A blunted pop from the main level — wood, surely, normal.

He stood, careful to not make a sound, and put his ear against the door. Monte whimpered.

A creak outside the door.

Martin’s heart hammered against his ribs. This is insane, he thought.

He held his breath and cracked open the door so slightly that he could only make out shadowy shapes through the vacant space. A shape moved.

He opened the door another inch, and Monte erupted into a frenzied barking fit.

There in the hallway, with dreadful blank faces, three copies of Martin crept toward the bedroom, the nearest rising from his crouch at the sight of the real Martin and reaching his hand to the door, five fingers outstretched, and the others rushing in to break through.