The Never List

here. One way or another.”
    “No,” Tracy said, her eyes igniting with sudden fire, “we’re going to get out of here. We just need to know more. Adele needs to come clean.”
    She stood up and turned to face Adele.
    “Adele, you’ve been here before, haven’t you? Whatever it is you’re hiding from us, you have to tell us now. You may not even realize you have the key to get us out of here. Or maybe you do realize it. We need to know who else is involved. Who left those letters? Who trapped us? Who got this house ready for us? Who put out the welcome sign? Jack has to have had some help. He is in prison, after all.”
    At that we heard a noise, unmistakable this time, coming from underneath our feet. A thump. We all sat up, alert, leaning forward, listening. There it was again, a thump. In the cellar. There was no ignoring it now.
    “What is that?” Christine spoke first.
    We stood up simultaneously and walked to the door that led down to the bowels of the house, Adele following us a few feet behind, a look of sheer terror on her face.
    We stood there in the hallway, in front of that cellar door. The coded locks were there, but the door was slightly ajar. As though someone wanted us to go down there. As though the very house itself was luring us down. Down into that cellar. Again we heard the noise.
    Taking one deep breath, Tracy pulled the door open and took a step down the stairs. As her foot hit the first tread, Christine balked.
    “I can’t go down there. I really, really can’t.” She stepped back into the door of the library.
    “You can go in there but not down there? That makes no sense,” Tracy whispered in frustration.
    “Leave her alone. I feel the same way, but we need to see what that sound was. Maybe she can keep watch upstairs,” I said, motioning for Tracy to continue. Tracy shook her head but then went on.
    We carefully made our way down the stairs. My nerves were rattled by the sound of those too-familiar creaks from my nightmares. I counted them automatically, without realizing I was doing it out loud. Tracy turned around and glared. I stopped.
    But in that moment our eyes met, and the years we spent together flashed through my mind, blurred into a dark-gray haze of memory. Every pain, every sorrow, every regret was suddenly racing through my body, fused into a powerful sense memory of our past life. And here was Tracy, my rival, my enemy, my tormentor, and yet the only one who could truly share this moment with me. For a split second, we were worn-out soldiers fighting together in the same lost cause.
    And we both recognized the electricity passing between us. A sinking in the stomach, a terror rising in our throats, a shadow of evil passing over our hearts, that only we could possibly understand. This energy, this current, this place. We looked away at the same time, unable to bear it.
    Down in the cellar, I felt my chest tighten. The dank smell of it was exactly the same. The chains might have been gone, but the rings attached to the walls were still there, as menacing as ever. The box still sat in its corner, shut up tightly. There was no one there.
    At the sight of the box, my stomach clenched again. Yes, it had all been real. Yes, I really did lose Jennifer. There it was. Wood and nails and agony. Unimaginable. Yet undeniable.
    Then as Adele reached the last step, the sound came again. Only this time we could tell it came from inside the box. Automatically, my brain struggled to detect a pattern to it, just as I had listened for Jennifer all those years ago.
    Hearing the sound, Adele turned around and darted back upthe stairs. But before she could make it even halfway up, Tracy grabbed her arm and held it fast.
    “Oh, no, Adele. You’re in this with us now,” she said.
    At that moment something stirred at the top of the stairs. Christine was standing there, clutching her broom handle for dear life. Her face was tense, her eyes looking past me to the box in the corner.
    “I’m coming too,” was all she said. She seemed to be holding her breath as she carefully made her way down the stairs. I pointed to the box, and we nodded, taking small, tentative steps toward it. Inching our way in the dark cellar toward the one thing we never wanted to see again.
    The door to the box was fastened with a piece of thin rope, tied in an elaborate knot. Tracy was the only one brave enough to walk all the way over to it. The rest of us stopped a few feet away. We all stood behind her,