Excerpt

I walked to the mattress, turned and looked up. I looked around the walls again. I saw a little opening twenty-four inches wide at the opposite end, where we had come in. “Where does that go?”

“I don’t know," Dale said.

“Come on you macho types. I’m not going by myself!" I took the flashlight out of Dale’s hand and squeezed through the opening.

“Stay here, Sammy. We will go," Dale said.

“No, you stay behind me. You have had over a month." I walked along a narrow ledge to the back of the small cave. Sam followed behind me and Dale behind him. It smelled wet and moldy. “Anyone have matches?”

“Yes. Here is a whole box for lighting lanterns," Dale handed them to Sam who handed me the box. I lit a match and watched the direction of the smoke and flame. It looked solid, but the match told me air was coming from somewhere behind the rock. “Here, hold this flashlight." I handed back behind me to Sam. I took my fingers and tried to move the rock. Nothing. I knelt down, put my fingers behind the rock, below it and it swung out. “Damn things on a hinge. It had a horrible smell. What is that smell?”

“Death," Sam said coldly.

“Yeah, thou I walk through the valley of death, I shall fear no evil.”

“Here, let me do that. You tell me what to do," Sam said.

I shone the light in the water beside us. “Look at the current, it is flowing from somewhere. Water flows downhill." Sam put his hands on my waist. “No, you pull me out if I yell. If we change places on this six-inch ledge, I’m going to be in that water!”

“Careful," he warned. I shone the flashlight in the 36” opening. I crawled on my stomach along the passage, ten feet into a large cave and stood up. I knelt down and yelled through the passage. “It is a larger cave. Come on you macho guys,"

“I’m going back for a lantern and help," Dale said.

“Chicken shit.”

“Okay, I’ll go with you guys." Dale yelled back for lanterns and then crawled through the hole behind Sam.

I gently slid my foot one step at a time. I reached up and held on to something and it moved. I quickly shone my flashlight up. “Oh, my god. I’m out of here!" I turned around and into Sam’s arms.

“You are okay. What is it?” Sam asked.

I handed him the bone of an arm, with the bones of a hand dangling on it. It looked like Halloween only no one was laughing. “Oh, Christ. Here, give it to me." I did. He turned around and handed it to Dale.

“Where the hell did you find this?” Dale’s voice was rising.

“I was feeling my way along. You guys use your flashlights." I buried my head in Sam’s chest standing on a six-inch ledge. I could feel my stomach rubbing against it’s self.

“There is the notebook," Sam discovered.

“Do I want to turn around?”

“Yes. There are bodies all over in here. Don’t look at them. I will shine the notebook and you get it. We can’t change places on this narrow ledge," Sam explained.

“Give me one of those Rock-your-Socks Kisses of yours.”

“What, here?” he asked.

“Hell yes, here!"

He put his arm around me, lifted me on my tippy toes, stuck his tongue in my mouth and ran it across the roof of my mouth. “How is that?” he asked.

“Delicious! Thank you, I needed that." I turned back around and wobbled. He caught me with his arm. He shined the light twenty feet ahead on the notebook. “Okay. I’m doing fine." I shone the flashlight on my right and saw bones stacked up on the rocks.

“Don’t look at them," Sam warned.

“I have to feel my way along. I don’t want anymore arms, thank you. Dale are you still back there?”

“Yes, ma’am. I won’t leave you guys. Are you okay?” Dale asked.

“Hell no.”

“Is that all she says is ‘hell yes’ and ‘hell no?’” Dale laughed.

“When she gets scared the vocabulary becomes rather abrupt," Sam chuckled.

“You guys are not one bit funny, just keep laughing.”

“Look only at your feet," Sam instructed.

“Oh.”

“What?” Sam snapped behind me.

I bent down in front of me. “Someone’s hair!" My voice raised and I handed him a scalp with long black hair. I eased my way forward. Stuck in a crack between two huge boulders, was a book in a plastic bag. I reached it and tugged it loose. “Okay, about face.”

SPLASH. Sam and I flashed our lights into the water. There was Dale treading water. “I slipped, damn it!" We both laughed. Sam bent down and reached his hand out. I could see more bones through the crystal, clear water. Dale got back up on the ledge. Sam pulled him back up and he was doing a lot of mumbling and cursing. We all retraced out steps. We were finally standing outside by the four-wheeler in the sunshine. “What happened to the notebook?” Dale asked, with a blanket around his shoulders. He shivered a little.

I unzipped my windbreaker and pulled it from between my breasts. I opened the Ziploc. “I get to read it first. You made me touch all of those bones.”

“Hell of a place to keep it," Dale noted.

“It is where she stores things, like a squirrel," Sam laughed.

It was a little turquoise address book. I looked under “A”. Angel, I love you. Amy, KY. Anita, IL. Alice, IN. I took my thumbnail and flicked through the pages. I closed the book and handed it to Sam. They both huddled and talked about what things meant. I didn’t want to know. There had to be hundreds of women’s names!