What She Left Behind (21 page)

They started moving again. Then Dave and Josh stopped.

“What is it?” Luke said. “Why are we stopping?”

“I just heard something,” Dave said.

“Me too,” Josh said.

“What was it?” Crystal said.

“I don’t know,” Dave said. “It sounded like something moving in the next room. Like rustling or something.”

“There’s no door on the next room,” Dave said.

“So?” Alex said.

“You go first,” Josh said to her, gesturing with his flashlight toward the black, empty entrance to his left.

Alex grabbed the flashlight, took a deep breath, and stepped in front of the entrance, shining the beam into the room. “Gross,” she said, and went through the opening. Everyone followed.

Moonlight streamed in through the barred, filthy windows, casting long, striped shadows on the tile floor. Giant hunks of plaster hung down from the ceiling, exposing old lathe and thick clots of black mold. Beneath the windows, the outer bricks showed through jagged holes above piles of dust and plasterboard. In the center of the room, a thick metal pole came out of the floor, a curved rod sprouting from one side in an elongated
S
. At the end of the curved rod, a blue plastic seat and buckle hung in the air like a carnival swing. Izzy’s stomach twisted, thinking of the hundreds of tortured souls who had sat in that very chair and had who knows what done to them. To the left, a rusty pipeline and a half dozen porcelain tubs lined one enamel wall. The tubs were surrounded by metal frames and all but one were covered with a dirty, ripped canvas. The canvases were riveted to the metal frames, with a reinforced hole for the patient’s head yawning on one end like an open mouth. Izzy shivered, wishing she’d tried harder to get out of coming.

“What the hell is this?” Luke said, sitting in the plastic seat attached to the pole. He pushed his feet on the floor and the seat spun around.

“I have no idea,” Alex said. “But these tubs were used for ice water baths. They used to plunge the patients into freezing water and keep them there until they lost consciousness.”

“Come on,” Josh said. “I thought we came in here to find the morgue.”

“Yeah,” Dave said. “Let’s go.”

Izzy followed the group out the door, relieved to get out of the depressing room. At the end of the hall, they took a right, threading their way around wheelchairs, rolling carts, wooden crates marked Willard State, stained mattresses, and rusted gurneys. Eventually, they came to the top of a stairway. Izzy pulled the sleeve of her hoodie over her hand, grabbed the railing, and followed Alex down the steps. She didn’t want to touch the railing, but it was better than falling, landing face-first at the bottom of the stairs on who knows what.

The first-floor halls were cluttered with broken wheelchairs, small tables, and vinyl-covered seats with belts and wheeled legs. Signs above doorways read Chronic Block, Acute Block, Epileptic Block, Sick and Infirm Block. The farther the group went inside the maze of halls, the more patient-room doors were missing. Izzy swung her flashlight into the dark entrances, illuminating metal beds, moldy boxes, plastic containers marked Soiled Linen, carts piled high with EKG machines, examining tables with stirrups. Izzy scanned the junk-filled spaces for filing cabinets, but didn’t see any. She wondered if Clara had given birth to her daughter in one of these rooms. How horrible it must have been to deliver a small, innocent baby in this awful place.

At last, they found a sign that said Basement, with an arrow pointing to the right. They followed a short hallway to a service elevator and a set of double doors below a green sign that read Morgue. Josh pulled the doors open, a blast of cold air rushing past him, and started down the steps. Izzy, Luke, and Alex followed, with Dave and Crystal bringing up the rear. At the bottom, the group stopped. Izzy swallowed.

Wide cement tunnels led off in all directions, left, right, and straight ahead. Crusty, dripping pipes of various sizes traveled along the length of the ceilings, next to metal conduit used to house electrical wires. Every ten feet, a stone archway lined each passageway, making the tunnels look like corridors beneath a medieval castle. Izzy had the illusion she was standing between two mirrors, the reflection of the archway reflected a thousand times in every direction. She imagined getting lost and never finding her way out. On the archway straight ahead, a sign said Electroshock Treatment. On the archway to the left, a sign read Morgue. To the right of the staircase, a wide service elevator stood open, the rusty brass grate partly closed. A hospital bed with a broken wheel and a grungy, ripped sheet tilted against one elevator wall.

“That must be how they brought the bodies down,” Alex said.

“Ewww,” Crystal said.

Josh started down the hallway toward the morgue, his giant form nearly blocking out the flashlight beam that bounced along the floor in front of him. “This way,” he said. Dave and Crystal followed.

“Wait!” Alex said. “Let’s check out the room where they did shock treatments!”

Josh stopped and turned. “There’s nothing down there,” he said.

“Come on!” Dave said. “We’re going to the morgue!” He sounded irritated. Izzy wondered why he was in such a hurry. Maybe he was using anger to hide his fear.

“I’m going to check it out,” Alex said.

Josh grunted and lumbered toward them, reluctantly rejoining the group. “Let’s make it quick,” he said.

To the left of the tunnel after the fourth arch, they found the electroshock treatment room. The low-ceilinged space was filled with examination tables, rusty carts, and riveted metal boxes that looked like giant batteries, with black dials and wires coming out. Along the far wall, peeling medicine cabinets stood with half-open drawers spilling out wire coils, rubber mouth guards, and what looked like joysticks for a video game. Izzy walked along the walls, looking for filing cabinets or anything that seemed like it might hold paperwork. There was nothing.

“They must have shocked more than one person at a time,” Dave said. “Kind of like a herd of cattle getting branded.”

“Sure looks that way,” Alex said. “You said there was a flood and people died in here?”

“Yeah,” Josh said, rummaging through a drawer. He turned to look at her, shining his flashlight in her face.

Alex put up her hand, shielding her eyes. “Dude,” she said. “You’re blinding me!”

The flashlight beam fell. “Sorry,” Josh said.

“This is so gross,” Crystal said.

“I wonder if they did lobotomies here,” Alex said.

“Come on,” Dave said. “We’re supposed to be exploring the morgue, not wasting time in here.”

“Yeah,” Izzy said. She felt like throwing up. “Let’s get out of here.”

As they made their way toward the morgue, the air grew even more damp and cold. Izzy shoved her hands in the pockets of her sweatshirt and pulled up her hood. Beside her, Crystal swatted the empty space above her head, terrified that a spiderweb would snag her hair or whisper across her face. Without warning, Josh came to a sudden halt, shining his flashlight into an open door on his left. Dave kept walking, then stopped and turned.

“Come on,” he said. “We’re almost there!”

Josh edged toward the open doorway. “What the hell is this?” he said, his voice filled with disgust.

Dave joined him. “Holy shit,” he said. The two of them disappeared inside the room. Everyone followed.

The walls of the stone room were lined with iron cages made of two-inch thick metal, the bars riveted together in a crisscross pattern, like a loose basket weave. Inside the cages, metal cots were bolted to the floor and chains and cuffs hung from the wall.

“What is this place?” Crystal said.

“They kept people in these cages!” Josh said, laughing nervously.

“Maybe this is where they kept the violent patients,” Alex said.

“It might be where they kept patients with tuberculosis or typhoid,” Izzy said.

“This is so creepy!” Alex said. “No wonder Willard is haunted.”

“Can we just go to the morgue and get this over with?” Izzy said, trying to keep her voice steady.

“Yeah,” Josh said. “Let’s go. We can come back here some other time.”

The group filed out of the room and turned left. Finally, they saw a set of double doors with a faded metal sign that read Morgue in green letters. At the end of a tunnel, they could see another entryway, with broken windows in the upper half of the double doors. Muted moonlight filtered in through the grime-covered glass, like glowing blue eyes. Stack after stack of homemade coffins clambered up the walls near the doors, like piles of oversized books.

“Oh my God,” Crystal said. “That is so gross!”

They edged through the double doors into the morgue, moving slowly as if afraid something waited on the other side. Dave and Josh shined their flashlights around the room. Along the farthest wall was a deep, three-basin sink, its porcelain counter filled with yellowed plastic jugs and filmy bottles. Garbage cans and moldy boxes littered the stained cement floor, along with a corroded necropsy tool cart and several broken folding chairs. Industrial lighting hung from the peeling ceiling over a stainless steel autopsy table. On both sides of the table, near the middle, were square drain holes, and on one end was a small basin with a black hose. Next to the table sat a large, wheeled vat with a rubber hose coming from the top. The metal side read Embalming Fluid.

In the far corner, a wooden body storage vault with six doors filled nearly a quarter of the room, its hinges and handles rusty and tarnished. Next to the vault sat a black, corroded motor used to power the refrigerated storage chamber. The top two doors of the vault looked relatively spotless, their wooden planks reflecting the beams of the flashlights. The four doors below were stained and streaked with what looked like black tar, as if something inside the top doors had rotted and melted, leaking down the front of the unit. A faint odor of formaldehyde, mold, and something that smelled like warm pennies hung in the air.

Izzy put her hand over her mouth, fighting the urge to run out of the room and outside, toward fresh air. Then she saw a two-drawer filing cabinet in the corner. She hurried over to it and pulled open the top drawer, shining her flashlight inside. A stack of folders slumped toward the back of the drawer, nearly gray beneath a thick layer of dust and spiderwebs. Alex came over to see what she was doing.

“What is it?” she said. “What did you find?”

Izzy handed her the flashlight. “Hold this,” she said. Alex directed the light inside the cabinet while Izzy riffled through the folders, holding her breath. They were all empty. She opened the bottom drawer and found a haphazard stack of yellowed papers. Izzy picked up the top sheet and took the flashlight from Alex. It was a blank New York State Death Certificate.

“What are you looking for?” Alex said.

“We’re working on a Willard project at the museum,” Izzy said. “I’m just trying to see if I can find anything that will help.”

“How would you explain that to your foster mom?” Alex said.

“I’ll worry about that later,” Izzy said.

Just then, Crystal appeared. “Come on,” she said, taking Alex’s arm and pulling her toward the autopsy table. “Let’s see if we can get that lady to show up again. Everybody, get in a circle and we’ll ask if she’s here.”

Izzy looked through the rest of the papers. The entire stack was nothing but blank death certificates.

“Hurry up,” Alex said to her.

Izzy rolled her eyes and closed the cabinet.

“Everybody, get over here,” Crystal said. “We’re going to have a séance!”

“Awesome!” Dave said, hurrying over to Crystal’s side. “Good idea, babe.”

Luke pushed a soggy cardboard box from the autopsy table and said, “Hey, Josh, come over here and lie down. We’ll give you a massage you’ll never forget!”

Josh laughed and moved toward the storage vault. He opened one of the middle doors and shined his flashlight inside. The interior of the vault was pockmarked and full of mold. “I’ll lie down on that,” he said. “Right after you lie down in here.” He rolled out a rusted slab, filling the room with the sound of screeching metal.

“How much will you give me?” Luke said.

“Five bucks,” Josh said.

“I’ll give you ten if you let us push you in and close the door,” Dave said.

“Will you guys quit messing around!” Crystal said. “I thought we came here to see if this place was haunted!”

Josh came over to the table, leaving the door to the vault partway open. “Okay, okay,” he said. “Don’t get your panties in a bunch.”

“Shut up, will you?” Crystal said. “This is serious.” She pulled a small, fat candle from her jacket pocket, asked Dave for his lighter, and lit the short wick. Then she placed the candle in the center of the autopsy table, moving slowly and carefully so the flame wouldn’t go out and her fingers wouldn’t touch the stained surface. “Okay, come on,” she said in a soft voice. “Everyone, stand around the table. And shut off your flashlights.”

Everyone shut off their flashlights and edged closer. Izzy stood between Dave and Josh, her back toward the vault, her flashlight under her arm, her fists shoved in the pockets of her hoodie. Crystal took Dave’s hand and reached for Alex’s, the flickering flame casting dark shadows beneath her eyes.

“We have to be quiet,” Crystal said. “And we have to hold hands.” Alex bit her lip and took Crystal’s and Luke’s hands. Dave and Josh reached for Izzy’s hands at the same time. For a second, she kept her hands in her pockets, then decided to play along. The sooner they got this silly séance over with, the sooner she could get out of here. Josh’s hand felt like a soggy baseball glove. Her stomach turned. Then Luke and Josh realized they were next to each other.

“I’m not holding hands with a dude,” Luke said.

“Me either,” said Josh.

“Just do it!” Crystal said, glaring at them. “This won’t work unless we take it seriously!”