Free The Box by Brian Harmon Page B

She went to UMSL,” he replied, pronouncing the university by its acronym.
    Brandy nodded. “I have some friends who go there. Why did you decide to come down here?”
    “I guess I was looking for a reason to escape,” replied Albert. “Most of the people I went to high school with found colleges in the St. Louis area. I wanted something different.”
    “Did you not have a lot of friends?”
    “No, I had friends. A few, anyway.” But not very many. He supposed it was a pretty lonely existence where he grew up. It was not as though his family didn’t love him. He was close to his parents and he certainly had no quarrels with Becky, although when he was a boy he’d been the very epitome of the annoying younger brother. But he’d always had his space and they theirs and those spaces had always been respected. He spent most of his time with books and games. He didn’t have the vast number of friends that Becky had, and he didn’t have any interest in the sorts of activities that would have allowed him to make more. He also lacked the outgoingness of his sister, the cheerleader and homecoming queen. “How about you?” he asked. “Any brothers or sisters?”
    Brandy shook her head. “I’m an only child. Daddy’s spoiled little girl.”
    “I’ll bet you have him wrapped around your little finger.”
    “Only a little bit.”
    Ahead of them, the tunnel forked off. One branch sank into the darkness to the left, the other to the right. “That’s the last turn on the map. We go left.”
    Brandy turned and shined the flashlight back the way they’d come. “Did you hear something?”
    Albert turned and studied the tunnel. “No. Did you?”
    “I don’t know. Probably not. I’m just paranoid.”
    “Come on.”
    They began to move again. They were getting close. Whatever it was the map was leading them toward—if it was leading anywhere at all—was at the end of that last tunnel. If there were any ill intentions involved in getting them down here they would soon find out.
    “What do you suppose is down the right tunnel?”
    “Probably closed off just like it was back there. Or caved in.”
    They turned at the fork and started down what the map suggested was the last leg of their trip. They walked in silence, their conversation having died away completely. Every now and then one of them would glance back the way they came. Somehow the seed of paranoia had been planted and now they were overrun with it.
    Albert looked again at Brandy. It seemed surreal to him that she was actually here. A week ago he could only have fantasized about spending an evening alone with her. Again he wondered what it was that made her decide to come with him. Was it really just the adventure of it all? He couldn’t help but hope that her decision was at least a little bit about him.
    He turned forward again just in time to see a wall materialize out of the gloom. The two of them stopped and stared. It was a dead end.
    “What the fuck ?” Brandy turned and scanned the tunnel walls with her flashlight, trying to understand. They followed the map step by step, never faltering, they’d even waded that nasty, stagnant water, and for what? A dead end? She stared back the way they’d come, feeling like a rat in a maze with no solution. If whoever gave them the box and the key wanted them down here for sinister purposes, they were now literally up against a wall.
    Albert walked closer to the wall. Something didn’t look right.
    “What now?”
    He didn’t reply. He was staring at this new wall. There was something about it.
    “Did we take a wrong turn?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Maybe we weren’t supposed to go down this tunnel. Maybe this tunnel wasn’t open when the map was drawn.” Her voice was beginning to rise, fear sliding up her throat in great, wet, slithering clumps. All those stories that scared the hell out of her when she was a girl, those stupid stories about the haunted tunnels and the old witches with rotting