They Disappeared

killed four people so far, surely they’d kill Sarah and Cole.

We’ve seen their faces.

For one terrifying moment she fell into a comalike stupor.

But Cole’s not here. Cole is free.

She had to believe that he got away, that he’d make it back to Jeff and back to Montana and a life without her.

Sarah fought her tears and tried to think clearly through her exhaustion, through her fear, taking comfort in her one hope, her prayer.

Cole’s not here. Cole is free.

She let her anguished mind take her back home, back to where she was standing on a gentle hill that offered her the great sweeping plain and the eternal sky.

God, please let Cole be safe.

49

Somewhere in New York City

Dawn.

The first light of day made its way into the old factory, spilling down forty feet to the bottom of the pit where Cole Griffin was shivering in stinking water.

He struggled to be brave.

Don’t cry.

Then he heard the swish-splash again. Something else was in the water- something alive. Cole was unsure what it was but images and shapes were slowly emerging in the faint light. Keep away from me!

The pit was as big and round as his friend Tim’s aboveground pool. You could maybe fit a car in there. And the water-I hope it’s water-was deep.

Cole stretched. He couldn’t reach bottom with his feet.

His fingers and arms were sore from holding on to the metal bar so that he could keep his head and shoulders above water. Broken metal filing cabinets and twisted sections of tin ductwork were clustered near him. He was so cold his teeth were knocking together. He had to find a way to get out of here.

Swish-splash.

There it is again.

It came from the opposite side of the pit. Cole searched around for something, anything, to defend himself against the thing, or things.

He found nothing.

The dark circular brick walls rose to the world above. It was impossible to climb out of here. He clawed and pounded at them, banging his handcuffs against them.

It was futile.

Cole was overcome, on the verge of tears, ready to cry out for help, when the increasing light slowly revealed hope in the form of rusted metal rungs embedded into the stone, ascending to the surface.

I’ll climb up. I’ll get out and get help.

But as fast as Cole’s heart soared, it sank again.

His escape ladder was on the other side of the pit, where the thing was. Cole would not only have to swim across the murky water but he would have to confront whatever was splashing in it.

I can’t do this. Not with that thing over there.

At that moment he heard shouting, men arguing far off.

Searching.

Now they know I got away. They’re looking for me.

He stared at the ladder. He had to reach it, had to get out of there but that option vanished when he heard a loud bang, like a gunshot. Then the building reverberated with the nearing clamor of the searchers.

They’re closer now, much closer.

Keeping his grip on the bar, Cole moved and maneuvered to the heaped file cabinets and misshapen ductwork, hiding among them just as spears of light pierced the pit.

They’re right above me looking down with flashlights.

Their voices dropped into the pit along with small stones, nails and bits of debris that cascaded to the water.

Swish-splash.

Cole froze. He felt weight on his left shoulder, tiny claws suddenly dug through his shirt as a rat rose from the water. Cole stifled a scream. He couldn’t make a sound because flashlight beams lit the water, probing the junk around him. If he yelled they would hear him.

The rat moved closer to Cole’s head, poking its nose in his ear.

Cole couldn’t bear it. He swatted the rat away, the splash triggered voices of reaction above. The flashlight beams raked wildly over the water until they locked on to a furry back moving on the surface away from Cole.

The water plinked as bolts whizzed-splashed near the rat.

The men were trying to hit it.

Laughter from above and the light beams vanished as the men left the pit to resume searching other areas of the factory.

They didn’t see me.

Embracing a measure of relief, Cole took a few breaths.

He had to get to the ladder on the other side.

But I can’t, the big rat is there waiting to eat my face. He wanted to give up, cry out to the creeps. Take me back to my mom-I can’t do this!

But his mother’s words, telling him to get help, still echoed in his head, driving him to be brave, to face his fear. Yes, but the rat was fearless, big and getting bigger.

A monster.

I can’t, I can’t go over there, oh, help me….

“Cole, stop this now! You have to listen to me, son, and you’ll be fine!”

His dad’s voice suddenly came back to him from so many years ago when they were at his dad’s friend’s cabin at the lake in North Dakota. They’d gone up for a weekend of fishing. Cole was about six or seven and had gone off alone, stepping into a little rowboat tied to the dock. He was looking at the fish swimming around it, not knowing that the rowboat had come untied and he’d drifted. He didn’t know how to use the oars, panicked and cried for help.

“Listen to me, Cole!”

His dad’s voice boomed from the dock, over the quiet laughter of the other men urging him to go get him in another boat. But Cole’s dad had decided to use that terrifying moment in Cole’s life to teach Cole how to survive on his own.

“Push down on the oar handles… Now, push the oars away from you… Now, lower them into the water! Now, pull them hard to you!”

Cole’s first efforts failed. The coordination was hard; his dad and the men at the dock were getting smaller as Cole drifted farther away.

“I can’t do this! I can’t.”

“Yes, you can! Listen to me! Stay calm, think this through and you’ll be fine, son!”

Cole struggled, sobbed, but his dad would not let him quit and eventually Cole made it back, stronger than when he’d left, for he’d mastered the skill of rowing a boat and in the process had defeated a fear. Cole loved and respected his dad for teaching him how to survive.

His father’s words guided him now.