Jacobs Heart
Stories similar to this that you might like too.
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I yelled, sitting up and looking around the room. “Why the hell are we in this hotel?”
I looked down at my hands. They were clean as a whistle. I looked back up at my friend. “What’s going on?”
“It’s all right,” she said. She was still holding her hand over mine. “We’re safe.”
“How can you know that?” I asked, not believing what I was hearing. “If they caught us here, we’d be dead.”
She smiled at me and gently removed her hand from mine. “Because there’s no one here but us. No one can find us in here.”
I stared at her for a moment, then suddenly laughed out loud. “Oh, man! You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“I’m sorry,” she said, grinning at me. “It’s just so funny to think of someone coming in here and finding us like this.”
“Yeah, it is,” I said, still laughing. “What the hell happened?”
“I’ll tell you later,” she said. “Right now, we have to get out of here before they come back.”
I looked around the room again, trying to figure out how we could possibly escape. The bathroom door was closed and locked, and there was no way to get to the window without climbing onto the bed. And even if we did, there was nothing outside the window to climb up to.
I looked back at my friend. “Look, I don’t care what you say. We can’t stay here. We’ve got to get out of here.”
“We will,” she said. “But first, we have to figure out how to open the door.”
“Yeah, good luck with that,” I said, laughing again. “The damn thing looks like it’s been welded shut.”
“Not necessarily,” she said. “We just need to find the key.”
I looked around the room again. There was nothing on the dresser or nightstand. “This isn’t going to work.”
“All right,” she said, getting off the bed and walking over to the closet. She pulled the doors open, revealing a set of wooden drawers inside. “Check these.”
I walked over to them and looked down into the drawer. “There’s nothing in here.”
“Try the other one,” she said.
I pulled the other drawer open, and sure enough, there was another set of drawers. This time, they were filled with clothes.
“Holy shit!” I exclaimed. “Look at all these clothes! Where the hell did they come from?”
My friend smiled. “From the same place the room came from.”
I looked around the room again. The bathroom door was closed, and the closet was empty. There was no way to get out of this room without climbing onto the bed.
“Damn it!” I said. “Why do you think they left us here? To wait for the cops?”
“Probably,” she said. “But if they catch us, they’ll kill us.”
“So what are we supposed to do?” I asked. “Sit here until the police come?”
She turned around and looked at me. “We can’t sit here. We have to get out of here.”
“But how?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “That’s why we need to find the key.”
“You’re kidding me, right?” I said. “How the hell are we supposed to find the key when there’s no way to get out of here?”
“Just try,” she said. “If it doesn’t work, then we’ll figure something else out.”
I looked around the room again. “Okay, fine,” I said. “Let’s start with the bathroom door.”
I walked over to the door and tried the handle. It didn’t budge. I turned my head back toward the closet, looking at the bed. “Now what?”
“It’s got to be somewhere,” she said. “You just have to look for it.”
I nodded. “Okay, but where do we even start?”
“The sink,” she said. “That’s where most people would look for the key. We can start there.”
I looked up at her. “What?”
“Yeah, it’s a logical place,” she said. “After all, we need water to drink.”
“Well, yeah, but how could that possibly lead us to the key?”
She grinned at me. “I don’t know, but it’s worth a shot.”
I looked back down at the sink. There was nothing on the counter or anywhere else in the room. “Okay, then we need to go out into the bedroom.”
“Do you think we should?” she asked. “This is probably part of their plan.”
“Probably,” I said. “But if we stay here, we’re going to die.”
“I’m not arguing with you,” she said. “But let’s just take it slow, okay? If they catch us, we’ll be dead anyway.”
I nodded. “All right. Let’s go.”
We walked over to the bed and climbed onto it. I looked around the room again, trying to figure out where the key might be. I thought about the bathroom door and the fact that it was locked.
“Let’s see if we can open this,” I said. “Maybe it will lead us to the key.”
She nodded. “Okay.” She pulled the handle down, and the door swung open. The hinges squeaked as the door opened, and the hinges were still making noise when we stepped inside.
“Damn,” I said. “They really did a good job with this place.”
My friend laughed. “I told you. They just wanted us to be comfortable.”
We walked through the bathroom, looking at the toilet, the sink, the shower, and the bathtub.
“It’s pretty big,” she said. “Why do you think they made it so big?”
“To make us feel more at home, I guess,” I said. “If they made it small, we’d never be able to get in.”
She nodded. “That makes sense.”
We walked out of the bathroom and into the bedroom.
“Okay,” I said. “Now what?”
“The dresser,” she said. “Let’s start there.”
I nodded. “All right.” I walked over to the dresser and pulled the top drawer open. It was filled with clothes, like the other one had been.
“Same thing,” I said. “Nothing but clothes.”
“Damn it,” she said. “How are we supposed to find the key when we can’t even find anything in here?”
“Well, we need to keep looking,” I said. “Let’s try the bottom drawer.”
I pulled the bottom drawer open and saw a pile of women’s underwear. “Damn, that’s weird.”
“What?” my friend asked.
“I’ve never seen a dresser full of women’s underwear,” I said. “Did they make this place for women only or something?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe they have a girlfriend they bring here sometimes.”
I chuckled. “Yeah, probably.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “But it’s funny.”
“It is, isn’t it?” I said. “We’re just having fun, aren’t we?”
She nodded. “For now.”
We continued looking through the drawers. The one next to the underwear drawer was filled with makeup. She pulled out a few tubes of lipstick and tried them on. I wasn’t sure why she was doing it. We didn’t have mirrors anywhere else in the room, so there was no way we could see ourselves.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
She smiled at me. “Just checking things out.”
I looked around the room again. There were still no doors or windows. If we kept looking, I thought, we might be here forever.
“You think they’re watching us?” she asked.
“Probably,” I said. “They seem pretty paranoid.”
“And we’re their prisoners.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Or maybe we’re guests.”
She smiled. “I don’t know about that.”
“Okay, then,” I said. “Let’s try the closet.”
“Do you really think they’ll let us go if we find the key?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I guess we’ll find out.”
We walked over to the closet and pulled the door open. It was filled with more clothes. I picked up a shirt. It had a logo on it, but I couldn’t read what it said.
“You want to wear this?” I asked.
“Sure,” she said. “Why not?”
She held out her arms and I handed her the shirt. She put it on. “It’s cute.”
“What?” I asked.
“The shirt,” she said. “It looks good on you.”
I laughed. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
We started pulling off the other shirts and dresses, trying them on. Some of them fit better than others. We took them all off and put them back in the closet.
“Do you think they’ll let us leave if we find the key?” she asked.
I shrugged. “If we don’t, we’ll just have to wait for someone else to come along and free us.”
“How long do you think we’ve been here?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Not sure. It seems like a lot, but I’m not sure how much time has passed.”
She nodded. “They could have been waiting for us for days.”
“That’s possible,” I said. “But I don’t think they’d waste so much time on us.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re not worth it,” I said. “We aren’t dangerous.”
“But they locked us up,” she said.
“I guess,” I said. “But I don’t think it’s anything personal. They probably just don’t like people coming in and taking their stuff.”
“Yeah,” she said. “Maybe.”
The dresser was still empty. The bottom drawer had nothing but clothes. The top drawer held a few boxes of jewelry. There were necklaces, bracelets, and earrings.
“It’s weird,” I said. “There’s no sign of a safe or anything.”
“No,” my friend agreed. “But I bet we’ll find something.”
I reached into the top drawer and pulled out a pair of silver hoops.
“You really like that kind of jewelry?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s pretty.”
I put them in my ears and turned around to look at myself. She whistled. “You look hot.”
“Thanks.”
I walked over to the mirror and looked at myself. My hair was a mess, but my eyes were clear. I wasn’t wearing any makeup, but I didn’t need it. I thought about all the things I had lost: my boyfriend, my apartment, my job, even my car. But I was still alive. I was still me.
I smiled at myself. “I’m going to survive this.”
“Good,” she said. “We’re going to be okay.”
The End