Watched

Sitting on an old rocking chair with her son, Liam. She wondered why her husband had insisted that her and the baby take a take a trip by themselves to his summer home. He swore he’d meet her down here in a few days but had still yet to show.

The house was beautiful with a screened in front porch all the way around and a staircase to the master bedroom that spiraled like in a castle. But the porch had loose floorboards and made it unsafe to walk on in most areas and the railing up the stairs had nails sticking out. The kitchen, with a large sun roof, had an entrance to the basement which was heavily locked.

His only request, which felt more like a demand was that she does not enter the basement. Especially with their son there. Frightened and alone with their child, she did what he said and left the door alone. But now, it was early morning and their son was napping in her lap, and she was growing bored.

Cell service was spotty at best and she had already read the books she brought with her. She desperately wished for her husband to be there to entertain her, but he wasn’t. And the wooden, chained up door was staring her right in the face. Begging to be opened.

She got up slowly, as not to wake Liam and placed him down in his crib. She grabbed the baby monitor and put it in her short’s pocket. Then she headed for the door. Three locked chains, a deadbolt, and planks of wood screwed in blocked her from opening it. There was a sense of urgency in her gut to open the door and she could not place figure out why. She decided to deal with the wooden planks first, those would be the easiest to remove.

With a flashlight in hand, she went to the walk in closet which her husband had converted into his “tool room” many years back. She grabbed a screwdriver and went back to the door. It took her an hour to take those planks off but the screwdriver was the quieter choice of tool.

Now came the chains and the deadbolt, she started searching for a key everywhere. Up the splintered staircase, under a few of the loose floorboards on the porch, in all of the kitchen drawers and then the dumbest idea popped into her head. ‘What if the key is the same as the house key? It couldn’t be possible, could it? Would her husband be that foolish to keep a key in plain sight?’

There was one way to find out. She fished her house key out of her front pocket, the adreneile building up inside of her. Sure enough, all three chains came undone and all that stood between her and her husband’s secret basement, was a simple deadbolt.

She started to get anxious and was terrified to see what was down there. She flipped the light switch on from the outside, double checked her baby monitor, and had her flashlight in hand. Then twisted the key until the deadbolt made it’s familiar clicking sound and the door creaked open.