Unquiet Dreams (10 page)

Until Jeanette, until that spooky little girl with the creamy skin and the jet black hair started this week and took her breath away. Her big blue eyes, like some kind of expensive gem stones—ringing a faint bell of familiarity, why?—looked up at Margaret with such serious concentration, as if she were taking some kind of binding oath. And I was only explaining the collating of the monthly reports, Margaret thought helplessly. The girl looked younger than her supposed nineteen years, what with her Keane eyes, all elbows and knees in her short black dress—one of those vampire kids she always saw on the train, heading out as she was heading home, eyes just opening in the dark like kittens newly born. Jeanette had been one of them—and now she was gone.

Maybe she was just lost, Margaret told herself sensibly. SIM was a warren all right, all twenty-one floors of it. Maybe someone had sent her up to another floor to fetch a misdirected fax or to carry an urgent letter. Perhaps she was just wandering, trying to remember where she had come from, how to fall back down the rabbit hole. It's probably nothing. If it weren't for that nagging feeling in her gut, the sickness she felt, Margaret would be able to make herself believe that nothing unusual had happened, that the girl was fine. But it wasn't true.

Margaret poured tepid coffee into her cup, nearly overfilling it in her distracted state. Now she would have to dump some out to make room for the milk. Shaking her head at her own foolishness, Margaret walked into the dark cubbyhole that partially hid the silver basin from the rest of the room and stopped short with a sharp intake of breath. A black comb lay on the floor.

It was Jeanette's comb.

Margaret recalled how it looked sweeping up those long dark tresses, romantic, beautiful. It looked like the kind a Spanish dancer would wear, Margaret remembered telling the girl. Jeanette's eyes had sparked to life for the very first time as she told Margaret that it was carved from black jet all the way from some place in England, though she had bought it in a thrift shop in the East Village. Traditional for mourning, jet was, Margaret recalled with an unpleasant jolt. A prized possession: not the kind of thing that would be dropped carelessly. Margaret bent over to pick it up and as her fingers touched its shiny black surface, she felt something brush her hand, disappearing—if it were ever there—in the receding shadow of the comb. She held it close, scrutinizing the surface, and a smell hit her. Coconut oil! Jeanette used coconut oil on her hair—just like Carol, she realized belatedly. That's whose big blue eyes Margaret had thought of when she first saw Jeanette, though it was the tropical scent that finally triggered her memory of Carol (the two didn't really look that much alike after all, apart from those eyes) and had given her that sick feeling in her middle. Carol, lost Carol, her first crush all those years ago, beautiful girl—and that horrible sinking feeling, seeing her cuddled in the embrace of that jug-headed jock, knowing she would never hold that slim beauty in her own arms—

What was that?

A flickering in the humming tube of light above her, maybe, but Margaret thought she'd seen something just out of direct vision…no, surely she was mistaken. Yet the feeling persisted. Could it be the uneasiness didn't come simply from memories? Oh no, Margaret didn't even want to begin to think about that, because that would mean—what? That something really was going on, something really weird, something that really didn't belong in the hyper-normal, busy, busy, brightly lit corridors of SIM—something that was taking the temps she had hired, quietly, quickly, unobtrusively. So much so that Margaret had not noticed, no one had noticed, and fifteen people were gone. Poor little Jeanette! If she hadn't reminded Margaret so much of her college crush, how many more folks might have disappeared before she noticed? Margaret looked down at the comb in her hand, unable to bear the weight of these thoughts, and realizing at last that the feeling in her stomach had turned to terror. Strange that her hand felt like it had fallen asleep, at a time like this. Absently she rubbed it with her other hand and suddenly felt the pain. Turning her wrist Margaret saw that the fleshy side of her palm was red. The inflammation appeared where that phantom touch had grazed her skin. Her stomach clenched. "Oh no," Margaret whispered aloud.

Then something caressed the side of her foot, and a shiver of revulsion seized her body as she looked down, hypnotized with shock and a kind of stupefied wonder. A shadow, only a shadow, but it didn't seem to be cast by anything she could see, and as she watched, fascinated, it moved, coiling around her foot. Slowly Margaret began to understand that she was losing the feeling in her foot and a little bit her ankle too, and if she did not move her leg—that thought finally got her to break the trance and shake her leg furiously and stumble backwards into the brighter light away from the sink. The darkness faded, bled into the shade around it and was no more. Margaret blinked and finally expelled the breath she had not known she was holding.

Two co-workers walked into the break room just then, and Margaret slipped past them, trying to avoid meeting their eyes. Head down, she skittered back to her own cubicle awkwardly favoring the deadened foot, turned on her additional desk lamp and slumped in her chair. It was a minute or two before her breath and heartbeat returned to something resembling normalcy, and by then, Margaret found that she had clutched the comb so hard that the carved flowers had left indentations on her skin. Rotating her wrist she saw that the redness had faded some but was not gone. Her foot still tingled. Slipping off her shoe, Margaret saw with horror that her entire foot was red, and jagged tendrils of inflammation shot up her ankles. The skin was hot to her touch.

Margaret glanced up, hearing the voices of Janet and Brad as they passed the opening of her paneled square. Fearing they might look her way, she swung back around so she would appear to be engaged in poring over the payroll sheets scattered across her work area. What to do, what to do? Obviously I can't tell anyone, Margaret thought, they'll think I'm crazy, I'll lose my job. But she had to do something…

Call maintenance? Say there was something wrong with the sink, some kind of smell, some kind of…rodent? They'd probably only put traps down, unless there was something more wrong. And if one of them went missing, there would be a stink—they were unionized. It would be noticed, not like the temps—oh god she felt so guilty for not becoming aware of this sooner! But if it were a union member, well, it would be investigated. Someone else would have to deal with it, not Margaret. But she couldn't just hide from it. She already had fifteen deaths—no let's call them disappearances. I don't know they're dead, Margaret defended herself weakly. What did happen? They went numb from the touch of this shadow, this…void. And then? Well, they disappeared. It's not like it had a mouth—well, not that she saw—and if it had no mouth, it could not eat in the true sense of the word. Margaret winced, thinking involuntarily of her grandmother's old Latvian tales that frightened her as a child, stories that seemed inevitably to end with "And den it et dem all!"

She couldn't call maintenance. She could simply avoid that part of the break room and say nothing to anyone. Maybe convince others to stay away from it. Oh yeah, right, that was going to work. It was the office sink! Coffee pots were filled there, tea cups, cup o' soups, dishes were washed, hands, clothes with food stains, coffee stains. Oh sure, Margaret thought sarcastically, that'll be no problem at all. And what's to say it wouldn't come out further? If its food wouldn't come to it, surely it would come to its food…oh god, I can't think about this anymore, Margaret thought, not realizing she was shaking her head. Do some work, don't think about it for a bit, surely something will come, some solution.

Margaret turned to her tasks, sifting the papers, totaling columns, engrossing herself entirely in the figures, sheets and entries before her. She achieved it for a time. There was plenty to do, and the familiarity of the chores soon brought her into the preoccupied state of a comfortably busy brain, one totally involved with the tasks at hand. In fact it wasn't until she caught sight of a shadow from the corner of her eye—and flinched—that Margaret let her thoughts return to what she had seen earlier. Her skin remembered; even now the flesh on her foot held onto its red inflammation, though the severity had lessened and she no longer felt the numbing tingle. It seemed less real, though. The idea that something evil, something…sentient could be in the break room, why it was almost ludicrous, if only—well, if only she didn't feel that chill up her spine at the thought of going back there, Margaret could just pretend it never happened, pretend it wasn't real, pretend she didn't have to deal with it. But she knew the alternative was to continue to flinch every time a shadow touched her—or try to live surrounded by lights on full power all day, all night. But where there was light, there was darkness. Light made shadow. It was worse than trying not to step on cracks. Fear of the dark, even in the light of day.

All right, thought Margaret, I have to do something, I can't stand this. There had been one idea in the back of her mind. She went down on her haunches and rummaged in the bottom drawer of her filing cabinet, the unofficial junk drawer. I know it's in here somewhere, Margaret muttered, lifting out paper plates, balloons, holiday decorations—ah ha! She held up the shiny silver flashlight and flicked it on with her thumb. It rewarded her efforts with a strong circular beam. Maybe, just maybe—well, she would have to see.

Walking back to the break room, Margaret rehearsed possible answers to the question "So what are you doing with that flashlight?" but no one asked or even looked her way. Everyone seemed buried in their late afternoon duties, looking to get done and out to enjoy a Friday night. Margaret felt a rivulet of sweat roll hesitatingly down her back. Tension, yes, tension. Not fear, oh no. She wasn't entirely sure what she would do, but Margaret had settled on the vague notion that surely the void's opposite would somehow affect it. If it clung to the darkness, maybe it was because it had to do so. She'd have to risk luring it out in order to test her theory.

The room looked no different than it had earlier, but she knew more now. No longer creeping, uncertain and unbelieving, but warily picking her way to the thing's lair, Margaret held the flashlight ready. The fixture nearest the sink flickered—it wasn't just her imagination—then regained its steady hum. Margaret cast a look back over her shoulder, but there was no one coming. She stepped closer to the shadows edging the cubbyhole. Come on, show yourself! Unconsciously she held her breath.

Imperceptibly at first, the shades along the wall changed shape. Then she could see a hesitant foot creep out, oozing across the blue carpet to catch at her own shadow and wrap itself almost lovingly around her foot. At once Margaret felt the tingle of numbness begin. She could understand how, lost in thought, daydreaming, one could ignore the feeling—until it was too late. Like drowning or freezing to death, she imagined. So slow and not so terribly painful, gradual, like falling in slow motion; it was easy in a way, easy not to care, easy to give in, give up and let it flow over you.

The lights wavered again. Margaret gasped and looked down. Red blotches ran up her legs, disappearing under her sensible tweed skirt that was nonetheless short enough to show off her still pretty good legs. With a strangled gurgle of protest, Margaret switched on the flashlight and shined it at the seeming center of the dark mass. Without giving up on its victim, it serpentined out of the ray of light, fixing its hold on the side of her foot out of the immediate glare. Margaret moved the beam to a central point on her foot, rotating it in tight little circles. With a shudder, the void recoiled and bounced back to the shadows along the wall.

It worked!

All right. It didn't like the light. Only natural, after all. Okay—so what to do then? Stand here all day with a flashlight? Warn others? Oh yeah, that would work. Add another light to this corner? Maybe that would chase it away. To where? What if it did move along, where would it go? To another break room, another floor? A closet where it might jump out at anybody? What if it followed her home? After all, it was smart enough to choose its victims carefully. What if it held a grudge, followed her back to her flat, hid under the bed, waited until just the right moment and…

Oh god, no, Margaret thought, I can't live every day waiting for this thing to ooze out of the shadows and consume me. And she couldn't let other innocent people die, because she had to admit that's what it was—dead, they were dead all fifteen of them and she should have noticed sooner but she didn't and now she knew and it was her problem and she had to figure out what to do.

"Lose an earring?"

The voice behind her nearly made Margaret jump out of her skin. "David, you startled me!" She hoped she didn't show how much. "Yes, can't imagine where it's got to—afraid it went down the drain after all." She smiled and attempted to pass him and, of course, as usual he didn't really move enough out of the way and she had to brush against him as she tried to slip by. Damn Neanderthal pig. If someone else had to die—no, no, now that was no good. Much as she hated the man, she couldn't really wish him dead. Suffering maybe, but not dead.

Back in her cubicle, Margaret's fingers tapped a quick staccato beat as she brainstormed. She almost had it, but for the key. Light, it had to be light, but what to do with it? Something had been on the tip of her brain when Dave lumbered in—or had his presence suggested it? Wait, that was it! On "Wild World of Animals" the other night, there was that documentary on wild boar hunting, how the dogs had flushed the pig out and run it into the hole the hunters had dug. She could do that, she could.

Margaret waited until every one on her floor had gone home—or off to McSorley's for a beer, it was Friday after all—and for once was happy that this floor was almost all temps and folks like her who had few ambitions to rise above their current positions. As a rule, no one on six worked late. Go up two, three floors, and you'd see lights on past ten, even on Friday. Lots of enterprising people putting in face time, trying to get ahead, to feed their ambitions. But not here, which made things a little easier tonight. After running a quick check of the floor—no one, and the housecleaning staff wouldn't get to this floor before nine if they stuck to the schedule—Margaret lugged her lamp and a nine-outlet power strip to the break room. Using the flashlight to clear the way, she positioned the lamp on the edge of the sink and plugged it into the strip which was switched off. She made several trips, bringing lamps from other desks, trying to fix their exact locations in her mind so no one would notice Monday morning—if it worked, if. In about twenty minutes she had eight more lamps trained on the shadowy floor of the cubbyhole. Just one more thing needed.