The Mall Read online

  Above me I can hear Dan’s laboured breathing. There’s a good ten metres between me and his shadowy shape, but it looks like he’s slowing down.

  ‘Dan?’ I say.

  ‘What?’ he sounds understandably exhausted, but I really don’t like the defeated edge in his voice.

  ‘You doing okay?’

  He doesn’t answer.

  ‘Dan?’

  Silence.

  Shit. If he loses his grip or misses his footing, he’s going to land directly on top of me. I’ve got to get him talking.

  ‘Listen, Dan, okay?’ My voice reverberates around the confined space as I climb downwards. ‘There’s this TV show we had in the UK when I was a kid, it was like this freaky fantasy game started by that guy… fuck, what’s his face… Who’s the guy who wrote The Rocky Horror Picture Show?’

  ‘Tim Curry,’ Dan says.

  Thank God. His voice is faint, but at least he’s answered me, at least he’s moving again. ‘No. He played Doctor Frankenfurter in the movie, he didn’t write it. The guy I’m talking about… shit… it’s Richard somebody.’

  ‘Get to the point, Rhoda,’ Dan snipes, sounding almost like his usual self.

  ‘Anyway, this Richard bloke, he created this game where contestants had to pass this series of random tasks and tests, like mazes and stuff, and it was set in this alien space world or something. It was called…’ Christ, it’s as if my brain’s as numb as my fingers. It’s on the tip of my tongue. Then I have it. ‘The Crystal Maze!’

  ‘Ja? So?’

  ‘So what I’m saying is, that show is kind of like this shite we’ve got ourselves into.’

  ‘Right. Except that was filmed in a fucking studio and this is real fucking life.’

  ‘That’s my point. Because I’ve been thinking. What if we’re in some sick reality show? What if we are being filmed?’

  ‘Jesus, Rhoda.’

  ‘Well, why not? Stranger things have happened. You ever seen that movie The Cube? Or that one with the guy who tortures people and shit—’

  ‘The Silence of the Lambs?’

  ‘No, dumbass. Saw.’

  ‘No. I’m not really into torture porn or stuff like—’

  A blast of ice shoots up my right leg and I can’t stop the scream that explodes out of my throat.

  ‘What?’ Dan yells.

  What the fuck? I yank my leg upwards so quickly my knee bangs painfully on a rung, and my fingers almost lose their grip. I gingerly reach down and touch my calf. My combats are soaking wet.

  ‘Fuck! We’ve just hit water.’

  ‘How can there be…? You sure?’

  ‘Course I’m fucking sure!’

  ‘Okaaay, how deep is it?’

  I spread my legs as far as they’ll go on the narrow rung and peer down between my feet. The water almost touches my shoes and glints blackly up at me. I can make out three more rungs below its surface, and then, just darkness.

  ‘Have we hit the bottom?’ Dan calls.

  ‘I don’t think so, just wait.’

  I edge down further, wincing as the water seeps over my calves, and then clings icily to my thighs. It fucking stinks like a railway station toilet. I stop before it reaches my pockets and soaks my phone and the remains of the blow.

  ‘This is getting ridiculous,’ I snap.

  ‘It’s getting ridiculous now?’

  ‘You want to go back up?’

  He knows this is not an option. ‘So how deep is the water?’

  ‘I can’t tell.’

  ‘Shit. Well, we’ve got no choice. We’ll have to go down.’

  ‘Dan,’ I say, keeping my voice level. ‘Can you swim?’

  ‘Ja. Of course.’

  ‘Thing is… I can’t.’

  ‘Oh fuck. You’re not serious?’

  ‘As a heart attack.’ As serious as someone who’s fucked up her life for five hundred rands’ worth of blow can get. ‘I really can’t swim.’

  I wait for him to snark or laugh at me. He doesn’t.

  ‘How am I going to get past you?’ he says instead.

  ‘Wait.’

  I squash my body as far over to the side of the shaft as pos sible and cling on with my left arm curled around the rungs, my spine crushed uncomfortably against the brickwork.

  It takes him ages to creep down towards me, and he narrowly avoids clonking me on the head with his boots. He manoeuvres his body alongside mine, and for a second we’re face to face, lips almost touching. I can feel his breath on my cheeks. He’s clearly scared shitless, but there’s no way, right now, that he can be anywhere near as terrified as I am.

  ‘You sure you want to do this?’ I say.

  ‘Someone’s got to check it out,’ he says.

  True. And there’s no fucking way it’s going to be me.

  He hands me his phone. He moves carefully down past me, and in seconds I’m looking down at the top of his head.

  ‘Any last words?’ I say, doing my best to smile.

  ‘Ja,’ he says. But he doesn’t tell me what they are. I watch as he climbs, hand over hand, down into the depths, not even wincing as the cold water tops his shoulders. Looking straight up at me he takes several deep breaths, and without another word, pulls himself under. The water laps over his head, feathering his hair out in long wispy fingers, and then he’s gone, leaving behind nothing but a lonely air bubble that pops to the surface.

  My fucking hero.

  How long can someone hold their breath for? Thirty seconds? A minute? Two minutes? Fuck it. Didn’t that stupid magician prick hold his breath for like ten minutes or something? But he nearly died, didn’t he? Shit.

  I try not to count, but I can’t help it:

  One white horse.

  Two white horses.

  Three white horses…

  It’s not as if I can go and rescue him if he gets into trouble.

  This was a stupid idea. I peer upwards, trying to figure out how long it would take me to climb up if I had to.

  I can’t even see the trapdoor any more. Not even a pinprick. And I’m not sure I’d have the energy to make it. Not to mention the rabid hobo or monster or salivating mutant that’s waiting for us at the top.

  It must be at least forty white horses now. For a second I have an eerily clear picture of forty white horses galloping across Hampstead Heath. Then fifty.

  Fifty white horses. Imagine.

  Sixty.

  Jesus Christ, oh please, Dan, come up now. I pull out my phone, remembering that creepy countdown thing. It now reads: <24:10>.

  Fuck.

  I watch the seconds slip away.

  Nine, eight, seven, six.

  I look away for what feels like a moment and the numbers now read: <22:50>.

  Dan’s been gone for over three minutes. My teeth are beginning to chatter now, and I’m pretty sure the freezing water isn’t the cause. To take my mind off it, I pull out his phone and scroll through his inbox. I skip past the freakazoid messages from the psycho fuckwits, but there aren’t many others. There are a few from ‘MOM’, most along the lines of: ; and a couple from someone called KARL: ; and one that’s quite interesting. Who’s blondie? The bitch from the store? Has naughty Dan been telling porkies to his mates? His ‘sent message’ box doesn’t tell me much. Either he empties it out religiously, or he’s not much of a communicator. There are no stored photos.

  The clock now reads: <21:02>. I slip the phone back into my pocket and then, suddenly, the water below froths and his head appears, his hair slicked back and shiny.

  ‘Oh thank fuck!’

  He takes in deep lungfuls of air in shuddering breaths, and shakes his head, spattering droplets everywhere.

  ‘Well?’ I say. ‘Is there a way out?’

  He nods, gasping, still unable to speak. He clings to the rungs of the ladder, and finally seems to
get his breathing under control.

  ‘How bad is it?’ I say.

  ‘You ever see that movie? The one about the boat?’

  ‘The Perfect Storm?’

  ‘No. The one about the ocean liner that goes down.’

  Oh fuck. ‘The Poseidon Adventure?’

  ‘Ja.’

  ‘Oh, fuck you, Dan.’ Talk about sensitive. The original one gave me nightmares for weeks.

  ‘Sorry.’ He doesn’t sound that sorry. ‘Rhoda, can you really not swim at all?’

  ‘Almost drowned when I was a kid. At the Tipton Leisure Centre. Haven’t tried since. Not much call for swimming in Birmingham.’

  ‘Is that where you’re from?’

  I nod. My heart’s rat-a-tat-tatting in my chest, and I can’t seem to get enough oxygen into my lungs. ‘Not at first. We moved around a bit. My dad, you know, he’s an academic and so we kind of moved around a lot when I was a kid, although most of the time we stayed in Orpington and then we moved to Ipswich and then Birmingham and then when my dad got tenure we…’ I’m really babbling now, and I allow my voice to trail away. I’d rather hang here on a rung and shoot the shit all day than get any closer to that fucking three-minute water. There’s a lump in my throat the size of a sewer rat.

  ‘It’s going to be okay,’ he says.

  ‘But our phones… they’ll get wet and…’

  ‘Fuck it. Do we really want another message from whoever’s doing this?’

  I shake my head. I have never been this scared. ‘I can’t do this, Dan.’

  ‘Listen. I’m going to go down first. It’s not too far, and you can use the rungs to pull yourself down – and don’t swallow any of the water. Trust me. It’s fucking awful.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘When your feet hit the bottom, drop to your knees, there’s an opening to your right that leads into some sort of outlet pipe, we need to swim through that to get to the other side.’

  ‘How far is it?’

  He shakes his head again, but avoids my eyes.

  ‘How far?’

  ‘Not far.’ He’s really crap at lying.

  ‘Seriously, Dan. How far?’

  ‘Ten metres – but I’m going to help you.’

  ‘Fuuuuck.’

  ‘It’s not that bad, really. Easy peasy.’

  ‘Is that why you were so long? You came out the other side?’

  He nods.

  ‘Okay,’ I say. ‘Dan… you know how you said you hated mirrors?’

  ‘Ja.’

  ‘Well, I really, really hate water.’

  ‘You think they know that? The arseholes who are fucking with us?’

  ‘What do you think?’

  From above us there’s the sound of the trapdoor clanging. I swear I can make out that thing’s snotty panting. We’ve run out of time.

  ‘Take a deep breath,’ Dan says.

  ‘Wait,’ I say. ‘I can do better than that.’

  I pull out the envelope, and not caring what he thinks of me, I snort the last of the blow. It’s a massive hit, and as most of it’s still clogged together, a chunk gets stuck in my nose. I snort it back, and wince as it catches in my throat. ‘I’m ready.’

  I wait for him to duck back down below the surface, and then, trying to push away the image of that fat woman in The Poseidon Adventure stuck lifelessly in the flooded cargo hold, I suck as much air into my lungs as I can and allow myself to sink under the surface.

  Nothing more can come up. It’s impossible.

  Dan waits for me to finish retching before he speaks. He’s holding me up under the arms, and I’m really battling to pull enough air into my lungs. I heave again and foul water gushes up into my mouth. It tastes of old ponds and reminds me of dead rotting things forgotten on grass verges, and I realise that I’m babbling again, and crying all at once and no one has ever seen me this vulnerable. Except for once, and that was understandable.

  ‘You okay?’ he says.

  I try and nod, but my eyes are streaming and my throat feels like it’s been sandpapered. But that’s nothing compared to the blow-torch burning in my lungs.

  ‘You did really well,’ he lies.

  I’d started to panic way before my feet had hit the bottom of the shaft, and if Dan hadn’t dragged me backwards and through the underground tunnel I would probably have sucked in enough water to fill a swimming pool.

  My lungs finally allow me to breathe. As my head clears, and my breathing steadies, I’m aware of other sensations: my back’s also on fire where I scraped it against the floor of the tunnel, and my elbow throbs where I must have whacked it on the lowest rung.

  I realise that Dan’s still holding me, and I shrug out of his grasp.

  ‘You going to be okay?’ he asks.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say.

  There’s a couple of seconds of supreme awkwardness, and I heave myself up onto my hands and knees. I allow myself another hefty coughing fit, and finally take stock of our surroundings. We’re on a ledge next to a filthy underground canal which flows through a domed brick tunnel. There’s a solid wall behind us, and weak light is filtering through from the far end, but even from here I can tell it isn’t daylight, just a sickly yellow glow. Still, I allow myself to hope that we’ve ended up in a sewage outlet and will wash out somewhere in the real world. Now my senses are back on track, the disgusting stench of the water fills my nostrils. The top of the water shines greasily as if it’s coated with a thin layer of cooking oil. There’s something floating and knocking gently against the side. It’s instantly recognisable as a severed mannequin hand, the fingers curled into a fist, a metal bone protruding from the wrist.

  ‘We made it, Rhoda,’ Dan says.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say, trying to smile and ending up coughing again.

  ‘And look! We’re in another tunnel.’

  ‘Thank fuck for that,’ I say. ‘I was beginning to miss them.’

  Dan laughs, but it’s a broken, relieved sound, devoid of any humour.

  ‘I tell you something, Dan. There’s no way the kid came down here.’

  ‘Ja. But remember what the message said. “You’ll be lost without it.” We missed out on the market.’

  ‘Why am I not too disappointed about that?’

  ‘I’m sure they meant that if we missed the market we’d get lost. So I’m saying that if the kid did come down here, he more than likely took a different route through the market.’

  One that I really don’t want to think about. ‘And that thing? Think it followed us down here?’

  ‘I fucking hope not.’

  ‘Which way now?’

  ‘Haven’t got much of a choice,’ Dan says. He’s right. We can follow the path next to the canal and see where it leads, or return. And right now I’d rather die down here than retrace those particular steps. ‘You okay to get moving?’

  He holds out his hand to help me up.

  ‘I feel like an old lady,’ I say, wincing as I stretch out my limbs.

  ‘Yeah, I know how you—’

  We both jump as the water next to us starts to bubble and froth. A spurt of adrenaline hits me so hard that I can taste it, and then we’re running flat out along the side of the canal, feet slapping on the raw brick, splashing through shallow puddles.

  My elbow is suddenly yanked from behind, and I spin around and bash straight into Dan’s chest.

  ‘What you do that for?’ I yell, trying to wriggle free from his grip. From behind us there’s another churning splash.

  He points to the left. There’s an archway built into the brick and beyond it a brightly lit area tiled in white. I would have run right past it. He pulls me along, and our wet feet immediately start sliding on the slick tiled floor. Dan slips and now it’s my turn to grab his elbow and pull him up. We skid along as we both try and get a grip on the floor, like a scene in a stupid slapstick comedy. The corridor curves to the right and then both of us stop dead as if we’ve hit an invisible brick wall.

  ‘You have got
to be kidding me,’ Dan says.

  It looks so unbelievably, reassuringly, banally normal.

  In front of us is a grey metal lift door, the kind you see in low-end strip malls. There are two buttons either side of it, pointing up and down, and a row of back-lit numbers, ranging from 0 to 10 along the top of it. I look around for a stairwell door, but the rest of the wall is blank.

  Looks like it’s the lift or nothing.

  My phone beeps, making both of us jump.

  ‘Impossible,’ Dan says. ‘The battery must be soaked through.’

  I scrabble in my pocket, hands fumbling and shaking, and pull out the last remains of the sodden envelope, my lighter, a tampon that’s blown up to the size of a swollen thumb (which Dan looks away from in embarrassment), and finally grab my phone. The digital clock on the screen reads: <00:36>. There’s no message, but both of us watch as the numbers count backwards: <00.32>, <00.31>, <00.30>.

  ‘What the hell do you think happens at zero?’ Dan says.

  ‘I really don’t want to know,’ I say.

  From the end of the corridor there’s the sound of an enormous slap, as if a bloody side of beef has been splatted from a great height onto a metal table.

  In unison we both press the buttons. The number 10 glows red, then 9, 8, 7…

  I look around the area for some sort of weapon, but there’s nothing – just plain walls and porcelain tiles. I fumble in my pockets again, trying to locate the knife, but I can’t seem to find it. Fuck! What if I lost it in the water?

  We smell it before we hear it, that same rotten-meat, engineoil stench, followed by a low inhuman howl.

  ‘Come on!’ Dan screams at the door, lashing out at it with his foot.

  <00.05>, <00.04>.

  Ping!

  The door hisses open and we throw ourselves inside.

  ‘Press the close button!’ I scream.

  Dan whacks the control panel with his fist, and the door slides shut with infuriating slowness. There’s a brief pause and then something slams into the door. The entire lift rocks, and I throw myself over to Dan’s side and whack my palm on the buttons, hitting them at random.

  With a screech of grinding machinery the lift begins to move, shuddering and creaking. We cling to the greasy metal rail stuck onto the side of the walls.