(This is only the second draft of the book Worthless. Expect typos, plot holes, odd subplots and the occassionally wrongly named character, especially minor characters. It is made public only to give people a rough idea of how the final story will look)

Chapter 7

The grass alongside the roads looked sad and tired, brownish heads of straws hanging like mourning heads in the pale sunlight. The fields that surrounded Nakskov were still rich with crops, the local farmers having the climate calculated down to a point, planting crops that could deal with the weather of the season, thus allowing one field to carry several crops in a year. But they were nervous, or so the local news kept saying. Rain had been too sparse, and the downpour was being held back more than most years. Some had barked about climate change, but truth was, every year was either too dry or too wet, at least if you believed the headlines. Anything being 'okay' sold very few papers.
The bus kept a slightly uncomfortable speed as houses began to surround it again. Small hamlets around Nakskov would number a dozen to little over a hundred homes, some a bit more. The funny way these houses meshed together suggested that it was actually two hamlets, woven together by their growth over time, the second starting before the first ran out. Old farmhouses lay side by side with newer, fancier architecture, making it seem like turning your eyes was the same as nodding off and waking in a completely different place!
The old school came into view rather slowly, the first signs being the trees opening up, visible at a fair distance. A parking lot easily big enough for every local car to be parked there twice showed up like a clearing in the forest, until its concrete floor became visible. Cracked concrete, bike racks under rusty metal roofs, plants slowly reclaiming yellow brick. As the bus parked by the lot, half the school was visible, the other half hiding snuggly behind a row of plants that were no doubt much taller than they had been intended to grow. One low brick wall by the bike racks had been smashed, in a way that suggested a car had hit it on its way in or out of the lot. A drunk, a rookie, a stressed out person not paying proper attention, maybe. I got out and stood by the bus stop sign for probably a few minutes, just looking around.
The place, the school, was a bit known for its large second-hand market, but that market was only once per month, as far as I could remember. I had no illusions that I would be walking in and asking questions about the pink shoes. Even if anyone had been there, it was highly unlikely that someone would remember anything that specific. Honestly, I was unsure why I was even there at all. I simply wanted to. I wanted to follow a lead, gather some informatin, all the clever work done by clever people in movies that wanted to seem clever. It hadn't been fireworks. I wasn't crazy.
The nearby grocery store was tended by a guy not much older than I was. The old timey ding as I entered surprised me, but was actually pleasing to hear, making me feel like I was important to notice. Densely packed shelves had the basics that anyone living nearby or driving past might need, and snacks. Complex goods were left to the nearby Nakskov, this was local convenience.
"Hey," I mumbled shyly as I put a diet soda, two bananas and a chocolate bar on the counter. The bananas were mainly to absolve me of guilt for the sugar snack.
"Hey, what's up?" replied the young man. It seemed oddly familiar, very unlike the quick glances and efficient service in town. I caught myself looking around nervously, wondering if I was being completely stupid about it all, but his casual attitude did a lot to calm me.
"Like, fine, I guess," I answered, still keeping to the shy act, which in all honesty was far from entirely an act. "Is that, like, a school over there? The big thing across the road?"
The guy nodded, looking straight at me, as if we were buddies having a chat over a cup of green tea, or whatever people did together these days. His hair hung a bit over his eyes, which was either some 90s retro style or just him being too cheap or busy to get a haircut. It distracted me a bit, but I kept my focus as best I could.
"So, do people go there?"
He shook his head, leaning a bit against the cash register. He was bored. it showed.
"Nah, got closed in 2010, everybody got transfered to Nakskov. You from Nakskov?"
I nodded, fiddling with my soda after having crammed both chocolate and banana into the same pocket, using quite a bit of force to fit both in there.
"The thing is pretty much empty now," he continued. "I think they want to rent it out for things like graduation parties and stuff. Big building. And then there's the flea market, of course."
My eyes lit up and I looked at him at the sound of the last two words.
"A lot of people go here to buy at that market?" I asked, not sure what I was hoping for him to say. It was next to impossible to think he would remember anyone buying a pair of shoes there, that was for sure.
He just nodded and smiled, clearly looking for something to say.
"Is there some way to see the market? I mean, look at their stuff while I'm here?"
That question seemed to confuse him. I suddenly felt much less like some great detective, and far more like some snooping burglar.
"I guess you could look through the windows around the back of the school. Most of the stuff is on tables even while the place is closed."
Feeling self-conscious, I smiled and ended the talk very abruptly, taking my soda, sugar and fruit across the road. The air felt a bit weird as I left, angry almost, but I ignored it, blaming it on nerves after my little attempt at detectiving.
The part of the school across the road from the store was the other end of it, opposite where I had gotten off the bus. It was an older part of the school, plastered walls in faded yellow, small windows, and most of all, an archway through the school and into the second parking lot, one much smaller and doubtlessly much older than the one the bus had stopped at. As I stepped through, the first thing that struck me was an old tree in the middle of the lot, something that would be unthinkable at a school built today. Lavish, was the word that came to mind. But the boarded up windows of half the buildings showed how things had gone a different way for the place of late.
Finding the windows that the grocery guy had talked about was a bit harder than expected. The school had a bit of a maze design to it, multiple buildings spreading out in funny ways. But they all seemed built around a small courtyard, overgrown with bushes and trees that had at some point been purely decorative, judging by the brock paths going through the place. One long building, lower than its counterparts, did indeed have tables on the inside, in plain view of anyone passing by. Of course, anyone passing by would be a crazy person. Just getting through the plants and to the windows was a minor challenge in itself.
Peering through the dusty windows, I saw rows of pants, shirts and other clothes on tables, old fashion paintings hung by the dozens on the wall opposite them. Not knowing what else to do, I tried to find a table or basket of shoes, but saw none. So focused was I that I never even noticed the first few drops of water on my hand. Only when the sound of drops on the leaves began to fill the air did I snap out of my tunnel vision.
"Nooooo," I whispered entirely to myself, leaning back to look up at the sky. The pale blue had been drowned out by a muddled greyish haze, vague lines showing where clouds overlapped. And it was only getting darker.
"No no no nooooo," I whimpered, starting to look around me like an animal realizing it had run into a trap. The droplets were not wasting much time, beginning to pound down on the leaves of the trees nearest to me, a sound like gravel endlessly crashing to the ground. The heaviest branches covered me, limiting the rain to soak the ends of my arms that had been leaning against the windows. That would not last.
Puddles were already forming as I ran from my shelter under the overgrown trees. I realized much too late that I had no real idea what I was running to, and what I was running from was not going to be restricted to just those trees! In mere seconds, I started to feel water find its way through my jacket, a thick thing meant for wind and cold, but not rain. As panic started to set in, I remembered the archway, and my brain raced to map out the way there. As my legs struggled to get me there fast, I felt water begin to sneak through the fabric of my shoes and through my socks.
Once I finally stood under the archway, fully sheltered from the rain, it seemed like less of a victory than I had hoped. My jacket was wet, and I could almost feel the water make its way through the fabric towards my skin. My pants were not much different, and I could hear soft squishes whenever I put weight on either foot. Tiny splashes of rain even continued to try to get to me as the wind picked up speed, but the placement and direction of the archway were still, luckily, on my side. I had no idea how long that would last.
"U der?" I typed on my phone, fingers starting to tremble. I silently cursed myself for skipping on the proper spelling I had made such an effort with lately, but the bulk of my attention was on the rain that kept shifting its angle only a few steps away from me. I waited a few seconds, but no reply came. Mischa should be in class at this time of day, I thought to myself. We were the same age, but he had missed a year when he got some bowel illness that his mother's family struggled with. He had been homeschooled most of that year, but in the end, his parents had decided to let him repeat the year in proper school. Both were engineers, and both were very keen on securing him the best chances. Or at least, that's how he explained it to me. What mattered now was that we had different classes, and I could not for the life of me remember what he was supposed to be doing at that moment.
Looking to my left, I looked across the road, at the grocery store. It was tempting, very tempting, to seek shelter there, but I somehow feared the awkward one on one time with the guy in there. I had expended pretty much what I had to say in the few minutes I had already been there, and making up conversation on the spot was essentially black magic to me. For the moment, with the water not quite having made it through my jacket and pants, I felt safer in my little cave of brick and concrete.
Then the wind picked up.
The first sign that I had to make up my mind was some old beer can flying straight by my face, picked up by the wind god knows where! Small branches and old, soggy flyers followed, slapping against the brick wall at the mouth of the archway, on the side of the parking lot. For some reason, my first thought was to look at the ground in there, quickly spotting the occassional other can and piece of trash or debris. It looked clean at a glance, but the wind whipped up what was strewn in the corners. Looking to my right again, away from the parking lot, I started an inner battle with myself about the grocery store. But it was quickly cut off!
Somewhere, something made a sound, one that actually forced its way through the increasing howl of the wind and white noise of the rain hitting the parking lot and building. A loud clacking sound, complete with not just one but two echoes, rang out from somewhere. Turning my head, I tried to pinpoint the direction of it, but all I could make out was that it came from somewhere inside the school grounds. The water was now poking through the jacket, making a valid attempt at soaking me, and if ever there was a time to make a run for it, this was it. I made a mad dash, at least it seemed so to me, across the soggy, uneven parking lot, nearly slipping on a flyer for some summer concert played years ago. Poorly sheltered under the branches of the tree in the middle of the lot, I quickly made another attempt to find the source of the clacking sound, and raced towards the back of the low building with all my might, nearly inhaling rain as I ran.
My heart sank as I turned the final corner and saw the green and brown grass behind the school. Pools of muddy water were forming all over the place, growing almost visibly as I looked at them. The clack came from a window, poorly closed and pulled open by the growing wind, opening and shutting hard, making that sound as wood hit wood. It was a way in, I thought, but most of my attention was on the ground around it. It was a way in, but at some cost.
In all honesty, I surprised myself, sprinting through the puddles and with some agility whipping the window open and swinging myself through the small opening! It seemed a blur, like I was a passenger on my own journey, with some far more skilled person controlling my body. Then again, once inside, I fell to the floor like a wet rag, feeling pain shoot through my shoulder and neck. I was wet, cold, and hurt, but I was inside. Listening to my own heavy breathing drown out the now muffled sound of what was outside rain, I dared a small smile, leaving a hand to clutch the sore shoulder.
The floor was filthy. A thin layer, or perhaps more a film, of dust clung to its surface, moisture in the air giving it a bit of stickiness to it. I still had my bag along, for reasons I was increasingly unsure of, since it contained little more than a few school books. Habit, perhaps. When I picked it up from the floor, the slight sucking sound made me think of thick mud, but it was, at least, not that bad. What really bothered me were my jacket and pants, which were now not just wet, but felt almost slimy. And cold, very cold. That last dash to the loose window had pushed their ability to soak up water too far, and it was now seeping through everywhere. Cold water, no doubt also dirty, ran down my arms and back and legs, way too much of it ending up in my shoes. They were not waterproof, but right now that was more an issue with how fast water could get out of them, rather than into them!
There was no light, other than what dim sunlight managed to shine in through the large windows. Everything seemed grey, but at least I could clearly see shapes in the dull grey. A few chairs surrounded two tables, haphazardly placed, liikely from someone pushing them back when leaving long ago. Faded paper tablecloths were in shreds, major pieces on the table but lesser pieces all around it. An old shirt, in rather bad condition, was all that was on the floor. Beginning to tremble from my cold clothes, I picked it up, thinking hard about the opportunity. I had quickly tossed the jacket, it landing with a slosh on one of the chairs. My own shirt was another matter. It was drenched and freezing, but I still hesitated. In the end, it was the only logical thing to do. My own shirt sloshed beside the jacket, and with a frown I pulled the found one over my freezing arms. It was surprisingly warm, at least in comparison, but it felt weird to put on. Tiny bits of it seemed to crumble like burned paper as it scraped along my skin, and a bitter smell seemed to rise from it. I was already regretting the decision, but the idea of switching back to the cold, wet rag on the chair was not pleasing, either.
And then I stepped out. I had not even opened the door to the room fully before realizing that the hallway was literally filled with clothes! Standing there, in a locked school building, rain pounding its outside and darkness filling it inside, my feelings were mixed, to say the least. As with the shirt, logic won out, of course. I could already feel my body growing cold enough that getting sick could not be far behind. And yet, it was a bit of a personal challenge to actually do it.
T-shirt was easy. I grabbed something in black with an old, weathered band logo on, something I had never seen or could not recall. A big, warm sweatshirt was close by. The next table was pants, and I stood for the longest time just looking at strange colors that reminded me of what my mom had worn on old pictures from her youth. I was too small for the jeans there, and cursed my size for a second before just grabbing what seemed like yellow or green pants in the dim light. It was at a basket of socks that I stopped, feeling that this was getting personal. Grumbling as I grabbed a pair, I decided that I would be going commando. Second hand underwear was... it was too much for my brain to deal with at the moment.
It was very clear that I was in a school building. From even the most basic experience, I guessed where to find a bathroom to change in, dumping my wet clothes into a plastic bag from a table, ripping a hole in it for water to drip out. I hung it by my jacket and bag inside the room with the loose window. There was no other way out, so odds were that I would leave that way, too.
Perusing the place, I started truly appreciating the fresh clothes. I did feel guilty about just taking them, but I snuck a few bills under an empty money box to minimize the guilt. There were no prices, so they would have to do with my best guess. I had bought clothes at thrift stores, flea markets and the like before, seeing how common they were around Nakskov, but this was my first full ensemble. Most important of all, though, they felt surprisingly warm, seeing how there was no heat on in the building. A few towels from one of the tables had saved me from walking around like a wet dog, too, and I was starting to feel outright comfortable! One short hallway from the clothes was a whole section of furniture, and filled with a sudden careless abandon, I flung myself into a large, puffy sofa, grabbing a woolen blanket from a brown recliner. Had there been a TV, I would have felt at home.
Instead, I pulled out my phone, tugging the blanket in tighter around me. With the rain and the changing of clothes, I had never noticed the sound of Mischa responding to my text. Now, comfy and warming up, I opened it almost cheerfully.
"im here" it simply said. Part of me felt disappointed, but there was little more I could expect from my simple question earlier. Finding myself in a very different mood from then, I wondered what I had even wanted to ask. Nonetheless, my fingers started their dance.
"w u kno ab market at school s of town?"
I kept feeling the temptation to write properly, but Mischa got annoyed by that, I found that out early on. I still did it, of course, just to mess with him, but right now was not the time.
"uh is nice i guess" was his reply. My brain struggled to ask something meaningful. This was a clue. This had to mean something. But following that clue was not as easy as I had hoped.
"anyth weird happen there?" I asked, going for the broad approach.
"dunno" came the answer. "wait you there now??" it followed up.
"Yeah. Committing crimes" I replied, feeling a bit refreshed on the big sofa.
"no good, u shd go" he wrote, and I felt my brows suddenly frown.
"Y?"
"ppl say is hunted when closed"
I pondered a bit at his remark, looking around to see if something there could explain it.
"U mean haunted?" I finally wrote back. There was a brief pause before his response.
"yeah. Ghosts n shit, k"
Mischa had a strange sense of humor sometimes, and I was wondering if this was a sample of it. Still, the message got under my skin for a moment, and I got up from my comfy rest, again looking around, this time less relaxed than I felt I should be.
"4 rl?"
As I stepped out in the hallway, I felt the hairs on the back of my neck twitch. Suddenly, the dim lighting seemed ominous, and vague shadows seemed like more than what they probably were. I flinched as the ringtone of his message echoed from my phone and through the hallway.
"wrd ppl after dark, no lights on, prolly not ghosts but not safe. Dont stay, k?"
I stood completely still, looking at his message. My eyes were not really reading it, but my head was immobile, my ears trying to catch any little sound that could be considered alarming. The rain, hammering down loudly, made it impossible, though, and I started looking around again. I had left the furniture room through a different door than the one I entered through, and I was now standing in a narrow hallway, cluttered with old cabinets and office chairs. What caught my eyes was a much lighter section, down the end of the hallway. The end that lead away from the room with the window and my stuff, but a lighter section nonetheless. The lighter part carried weight, with my slowly rising pulse.
It turned out to be a walkway, the same walkway I had seen from the outside when running from the rain towards shelter under the archway. For a few seconds, I stood by the floor to ceiling plexiglass windows, looking out. There was nothing but grey out there, the rain so intense and dense that it seemed like a writhing wall.
"I go after rain" I wrote back, not expecting much of a reply on it. Mischa was likely going to be in class soon, anyway, and his texting would be limited to what he could sneak out. I was alone. Or at least, so I hoped!
With uncomfortable thoughts running through my head, thoughts of bandits or monsters lurking near me, I gave the door on the other end of the walkway a tug. It was up a flight of stairs, leading to the second floor of the larger school building across from the one I had been in until now. The whole design was rather funny, as if a drunk engineer had been pressed to fit everything in at the last moment. What struck me most, however, was the dirt on the floor. The second hand market did not extend here, so the ones running it did not clean here. Brown and grey ust mixed with thick, black dust, much like what I had found on the shirt that was thrown on the floor where I came in. It was probably not a coincidence. The lighting there had been bad. Had it not, I would have no doubt seen the same kind of dirt there.
But on the other side of the door, things got more confusing. I stepped through slowly, whistling, of all things in the world, to signal to anyone that I was here and harmless. At least, that was what I intended. Since nobody reacted, there was no way of telling if it made sense to anyone other than me.
A short hallway lead past what looked like a small tea kitchen and into what turned out to be aq rather sizeable hall! There were no lights on, to no surprise, but at the end of it, to my far right, a large array of windows let so much dull, grey light in that the place actually seemed like it had mood lighting. To my left, the hall split out into two corridors, lined by large doors, with a very large sliding door in between them. What really caught my eye, though, was the floor. The same dirt covered it, and yet, it was not the same. The brown and grey, no doubt actual dirt dragged in from outside over a period of years that the pace had stood empty, was spread all over the floor in a thin film, like dirt would be. But the black...
Hesitantly, I walked over to a spot of black dust. It seemed like a rough circle, like the splatter from a water balloon, only not water at all. Like someone had carried black dirt in a bucket and dropped it, spilling it mainly in and out from a single spot. Except there were several similar spots. I counted, but lost count around the first dozen. The spots were mainly in the hall, but several could be seen as the light slipped down the corridors. My brain struggled to find an explanation, but the best I could come up with was some bizarre kind of dirt fight, people throwing balls of dirt at each other. And that, to say the least, seemed silly.
Mischa's texts still running through my head, I walked slowly down the corridors, but nothing really jumped out at me, figuratively or literally. It was just two empty corridors, large doors to big, identical rooms lining them. It took me a few seconds to realize that those were empty classrooms, and it honestly only dawned on me when I stuck in my head to find an old blackboard still on the wall in one. They connected farther back, but the short corridor between them was so shrouded in darkness that I decided to just not deal with that, instead returning to the hall and taking the other corridor from there. In all, I felt oddly disappointed, having geared myself up so badly, only to find a peaceful, empty school. Even the black dirt spots were fewer down the corridors, to the point of none at all.
Back at the hall, I made a few strides towards the walkway leading back, before I realized I was on the upper floor. I sighed, grumbling to myself at the choice between walking a similar round through empty corridors or just leaving and wondering forever what I would have found. In the end, it was not really a choice, rain still hammering away outside.
Getting down below was nothing more than taking a set of stairs near the long row of windows. The school had hints of a funny design to it, the outside landscape forcing part of it to be halfway underground, windows put awkwardly high inside to show grass and not the soil below it. But beyond that, nothing special met me as I opened the door from the stairs and stepped onto the first floor. The design was much the same, two corridors leading from a hall, some large sliding door between them. I had chosen to ignore the sliding doors, both the one upstairs and here, along with any closed door not showing signs of keeping something interesting in. The place was big. Looking at everything would take me forever.
In spite of slightly dimmer light from the outside, I could see the black spots on the floor down here, too. There were many, perhaps even a few more than upstairs, but they looked pretty much the same. Spills of some black dirt, placed with no clear pattern to them. Some here were a bit elongated, the circle shape turning halfway into a streak of black. I knelt down to touch some of it, but it simply brused from my fingers like dry earth. A few bits seemed flakey, like ash, but they were very much a minority.
My stroll down the corridors were also pretty much identical to that above, except for a few rooms behind the doors being bigger, looking like workshops and the like. I had finished walking down the second corridor and was returning to go upstairs and back to the comfy sofa when somethihng began bothering me. It started as an itch around my shoulder, then my waist. With each step, the itch became slightly worse, spreading to arms and legs, even feet, anything but my face. A vague smell of bitter and moist filled my nostrils, hinting faintly at something simmering. I did my best to get rid of the itch, scratching at it through my new second hand clothes. It worked, at least for a little while. But as I kept walking back, it began again. And as I passed one door, I heard a small fizz. Looking down the sleeve of the sweatshirt, I noted a few black spots, tiny dots that looked vaguely charred.
The door was like any other. There was a large room inside, which looked like it migght have been for something creative, maybe art. It was hard to see, since much of it was covered in black streaks, the black dirt smeared along walls and floor. Even when I looked up, I saw tiny streaks of it across the ceiling. They seemed like a chaotic mess of black, like a stack of buckets of the stuff had been spilled so violently it had bounced off the floor and onto walls and even ceiling. Still, as I looked at it with a mix of curiousity and unease, a pattern became clear. Most streaks seemed to point to a door inside the room. A door that was, unlike most others, closed shut.
I stood there for longer than intended, staring at the door, pausing only to occassionally glance around the room. The smell of moist and bitter was a bit more intense in this place, causing me to cough and blow air out my nose rather inelegantly to clean it out. Coughing into my hand, I found faint spatters of black in my palms. With my tongue, I tasted the roof and sides of my mouth, and the strong traces of more bitter made me spit instantly on the floor, a move that I instantly felt very self-conscious about. Looking around to make sure nobody had actually seen me do that, I stepped out into the corridor again. After a few coughs, I stood, bent over and with my hands on my knees, and thought hard about leaving. I still heard the sound of heavy rain outside, but leaving this building did not have to mean leaving the shelter of the school entirely, after all.
I didn't, of course. A deeper curiousity inside of me got the better of me, and I returned to the room and the closed door. Making the mistake of taking a deep breath, followed by the inevitable coughing out black dust, I gathered myself and grabbed the handle. The door resisted. It wasn't locked, but something had made it sit incorrectly in its frame, as if someone had tried to kick it in and broken it. A bit of force made it squeak loose, though, and it instantly made a crunchy sound as it began to break from the frame from gravity alone. With wide eys I briefly thought if I had to pay for the damages, but it seemed clear that the worst had been done long before I tampered with it!
Behind the door was a small room. Nothing much, clearly not even meant for students or anyone else to be in there for longer than whatever time it took to get something and leave. A few empty trays were smashed against the far wall. But my eyes were fixed on the floor. Long, thin floorboards were buckled, sticking up like a poorly assembled piece of IKEA furniture. None of them seemed to be actually broken, but they were definitely not fitting together right. And beneath them, there was a strange darkness, only interrupted by a faint bluish glow. On top of the floorboards, more trays lay smashed and thrown about, partially covered in that black dust. One tray, folded in half, was jammed into the boards. I felt less than confident as I stepped around the boards that buckled the most, making my way to the folded tray. To my surprise, it was a metal tray, rather thick! Whatever had folded it would have taken some force. And whatever had jammed it into the boards would have needed a bit of force, too! It wasn't until I grabbed another tray and whacked the folded one hard, several times, that it began to wriggle loose. With all the strength I could muster, I pulled it out, staring at it. For less than a second.
It felt like the world was breaking apart. Starting at my feet, I shook so violently I could feel my spine strain to keep me unharmed! My knees felt like I had jumped off a rooftop and landed badly, like they could snap without notice, and my hips felt like I had been kicked hard in the ass. It tore through me, and that I kept my balance for even a few seconds was nothing more than a miracle. After those seconds, I stumbled and slammed down into the floor, knocking not just chest and shoulders but also my head hard on the floor. Everything buzzed, colors blurring one way one second, and anothr way the next. I coughed hard, nearly throwing up, as I lay on the floor, inhaling the black dust that covered it. My eyes were stinging and full of tears as I painfully rolled over, wanting to see, as much as I could, why my legs were going up.
The floorboards were shifting. Like living puzzle pieces, they moved around, trying to find their place between one another, trying to align. And they did. Within seconds, all floorboards seemed to sync up in a strange dance, rising in unison and folding outwards like greeting arms. Or like the tentacles of a monster about to devour me whole.
My attempt to scrape myself away from the maw of floorboards ended quickly as I banged the back of my head against the frame of the door I had entered through. Combined with the slam from my fall, my entire head now felt beaten up, no doubt styarting to swell already until I looked like a badly made bobble head doll. But none of that really mattered. I was looking down the floorboard mouth. Blue glows, mixed with stray streaks of green and pale red, could be seen in the dark, in the belly of whatever floor beast I was looking at. And inside of it, I could make out scattered bits of clothes. More precisely, I could see a few charred rags, and shoes. At least three of them, from where I was sprawled out on the floor. Against my own better judgment, and with the voice of caution screaming at me in my head, I clampered to my feet. Then, keeping every available eye on the raised floorboards, I stepped into the mouth they formed.
The smell was horrible. Bitter and moist, as before, but also metallic, like burning machines. I had passed by an old car that some of the dumber youths around town had enjoyed setting ablaze, a few years ago, and the smell made that experience rush back into my mind. But my sights were on the shoes. Kneeling down, holding my breath both out of tattered nerves and to block the smell and the taste in my mouth, I picked one up. Like the pink ones by the disappearing woman, it was partially melted. As I turned it, black dust fell out in thick clumps, shattering into a mist as they hit the dirty floor. It was everywhere. Even in the poor lighting, I could see black dust everywhere. The itch returned, my arms and legs slowly beginning to drive me insane. I finally puled up my sleeve to see little black spots, tiny dots that seemed to smoulder ever so slightly. Burns. Tiny, tiny burns. I was burning. The black dust made my skin burn!
In my haste to get out, I suddenly found myself standing in the corridor outside, holding the shoe in my hand. Coughing hard, spitting out small bits of black dust, I forced myself to look at the shoe again. The inside was nearly full black from the dust, but as I turned it, something looked different. Still coughing, I made my way to the hall, seeking out better lighting. And once I was there, I looked again. Inside the shoe, along the side of its bottom, was some flakey stuff. Carefully, not wnating to make it crumble to dust like so much else, I picked it out with two fingers. It felt like old baking paper, crunchy and thin, brown and just a bit transparent. What really caught my eye, however, were little black dots on it. Little burns. Like those on my....
I felt my stomach turn into a knot. A sickening sensation filled my throat, and I threw the shoe and all inside it to the floor. It landed on the edge of a black spot, scattering the black dust slightly as it impacted. Skin. It was skin inside the shoe. My eyes jumped from black spot to black spot. Skin. The black dust was skin. The black dust was... people!
I froze. It took a few seconds for the rest of my brain to catch up. When it finally did, my head went forwards and I threw up! I kept throwing up till I was just pushing out air and sound. My legs felt numb, like rubber, like they could fold under me any second. And that was when the ringtone came.
"u still der" it asked clumsily. My eyes were filling with water, but Mischa's text was still readable. I tried fumbling my way through a reply, but my fingers kept slipping. Finally, on the verge of simply throwing the phone against the nearest wall, I clicked the call icon.
"Uh, yeah?" Mischa said, clearly surprised at getting an actual call.
"I think I'm breathing people,2 I said rapidly between dry heaves. There was a moment of awkward silence.
"You think you're what?!"
"I think I'm breathing people. I think there's peole dust in the air."
I could hear the noise of people in the background on his end of the line, but Mischa himself kept slipping into silence.
"Ida, are you at that school still?"
Tears were swelling up in my eyes, and I could feel my voice starting to crack.
"Yes. I'm so sorry, but the rain..."
I had no idea how to continue. I knew it was the rain that had me imprisoned at the old school, but I could only blame myself for having gone to look for trouble.
"I think something really bad happened here, Misch. Something really #*@!ing bad."
I was flat out crying now. Not wailing, not hysteric, but definitely crying, and he could hear it.
"Ida, listen closely," he said, in a very serious voice. "Go somewhere safe and stay there. I'll find a car and come get you. Do you understand?"
"You can't drive," I answered, instantly feeling that I had misunderstood him.
"I'll get Patrick or someone else to do it.
"Patrick can't drive, either," I answered, and I could instantly hear him get frustrated with me.
"He can do it well enough. Just... stay there. Find a safe spot and stay ther, okay?"
I nodded, realizing quickly that it made no sense to do so.
"I understand," I said, finally getting my voice under control.