Chapter 1 - The Sound David Was Never Supposed to HearDavid Mercer had been home for less than three minutes when he heard the first bang.
It came from somewhere beneath the kitchen floor.
A dull, distant impact.
Then another.
BANG.
David stopped beside the island, one hand still gripping a grocery bag. He had been talking about the friends coming over later, about the fresh bread he had picked up, about the fish he planned to pull from the basement freezer. Vanessa had been smiling at him, but there had been something unnatural about that smile—too quick, too stiff, as if she had put it on after hearing his key in the front door.
Now the smile was gone.
Vanessa stood halfway down the basement stairs.
Her long brown hair framed a face that had suddenly turned almost colorless.
“What was that?” David asked.
For half a second, she said nothing.
Then she shrugged.
“Probably one of the shelves settling.”
David frowned.
The Mercer house was large enough to make ordinary noises seem mysterious. Pipes knocked. The old furnace groaned. Wooden beams shifted when the weather changed. But David had grown up in this house.
He knew its sounds.
That had not been a shelf.
He started toward the basement.
Vanessa immediately moved.
“I told you, I’ll get the fish.”
“Vanessa.”
“You need to get ready.”
Another sound came from below.
BANG.
Weaker this time.
David’s eyes moved from the dark basement hallway to his wife.
Something inside him tightened.
Then he heard it.
A voice.
Faint.
Barely more than air.
“David…”
His grocery bag slipped from his fingers.
A glass jar shattered against the hardwood floor.
For one terrible second, David did not move.
He knew that voice.
“Mom?”
Vanessa grabbed the stair railing.
David rushed past her.
“David, wait!”
He took the steps two at a time.
The basement lights were already on.
That was the second thing he noticed.
The third was Vanessa’s phone lying faceup on a storage cabinet near the bottom of the stairs.
The fourth was the heavy metal door at the end of the hallway.
The walk-in freezer.
David ran toward it.
“Mom!”
A weak thud answered.
His stomach turned.
Behind him, Vanessa said his name.
Not loudly.
Not angrily.
Fearfully.
“David.”
He reached the freezer handle.
His hand closed around it.
Locked.
David stared at the handle, confused.
The freezer could be secured from the outside using an old industrial latch his father had installed decades earlier. It was rarely used. David could not remember the last time anyone had actually locked it.
He yanked again.
Nothing.
“Where are the keys?”
Vanessa stopped several feet behind him.
“What?”
“The keys!”
“I don’t know.”
David turned.
“You were coming down here to get the fish.”
“I was going to find them.”
BANG.
“DAVID!”
His mother’s voice was clearer now, but it sounded broken.
Terrified.
David’s gaze dropped.
Vanessa’s right hand was closed tightly around something.
“Open your hand.”
She stared at him.
“David—”
“OPEN YOUR HAND!”
His voice thundered through the basement.
Vanessa flinched.
Her fingers slowly opened.
A small metal key rested in her palm.
David felt the world shift beneath him.
He took the key.
Vanessa tried to speak.
“She went in there herself.”
David shoved the key into the lock.
“What?”
“She was upset. She wasn’t thinking clearly.”
He twisted it.
“She went inside.”
The lock clicked.
David pulled the heavy door open.
Cold air rushed into the basement hallway.
Margaret Mercer was on the floor between shelves of frozen food.
Her beige sweater was pulled tightly around her frail body. Her short silver hair was disheveled, and one side of her face was wet with tears.
Her hands were red.
She had been pounding on the door.
“Mom.”
David dropped beside her.
Margaret looked up.
For one second, relief crossed her face.
Then she saw Vanessa standing behind him.
The relief disappeared.
Pure fear replaced it.
Margaret grabbed David’s jacket with both hands.
“Don’t let her close it again.”
David froze.
Vanessa stepped forward.
“Margaret, stop.”
The old woman recoiled.
David immediately positioned himself between them.
“Again?”
Vanessa’s face tightened.
“She’s confused.”
Margaret shook her head violently.
“No.”
“Mom, what happened?”
Margaret’s lips trembled.
She looked at her son as if she were trying to decide whether telling him the truth would save her or destroy him.
“She pushed me.”
Vanessa inhaled sharply.
Margaret continued.
“She pushed me inside.”
David slowly stood.
His face had changed.
Vanessa saw it.
“David, listen to me.”
“You locked my mother in a freezer?”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“I heard her screaming.”
“She was only in there for a minute.”
David stared at her.
Vanessa seemed to realize what she had just admitted.
Silence filled the hallway.
Margaret began crying.
David removed his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders.
Then he reached for his phone.
Vanessa stepped toward him.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling an ambulance.”
“David, she doesn’t need—”
“And the police.”
Vanessa stopped.
For the first time since he had arrived home, something colder than panic entered her expression.
“Before you do that,” she said quietly, “you should ask your mother what she did.”
David looked at her.
Margaret’s fingers tightened around his sleeve.
Vanessa glanced toward Margaret.
“You begged me not to tell him.”
Margaret lowered her eyes.
David felt another knot form in his stomach.
“Tell me what?”
Nobody answered.
“Mom?”
Margaret looked ashamed.
Vanessa’s voice came softly from behind him.
“Ask her why her bedroom smelled so bad that I could barely walk inside.”
David turned.
Vanessa held his gaze.
“And then ask her what else she’s been hiding in there.”
Margaret suddenly whispered, “Please.”
David looked down at his mother.
“What is she talking about?”
Margaret closed her eyes.
And David realized something horrifying.
Whatever had happened in the freezer had not started in the basement.
It had started upstairs.
May you like
Inside his mother’s bedroom.
And judging from the terror on Margaret’s face, Vanessa was not the only person in the house with a secret.
Related Stories
