THE DOOR AT THE BOTTOM OF THE STAIRS
It’s like the rat said. The abandoned storage building is a concrete cube with a zigzag fire escape running up one side. You know from your firm interview with the sweating rat that a hatch located up there on the cube’s roof opens onto a secret stairwell winding down to the subterranean hideout. You flick your cigarette to the asphalt and grind it dead with your shoe. You ankle to the fire escape and climb. When you reach the top floor you transfer to the narrow ladder leading to the roof. On the roof, you eyeball the hatch, its chain, and its combination padlock. You withdraw from your coat pocket the scrap of paper with the combination scrawled on it by the rat. A few turns, a click, and you toss the padlock aside. The chain rattles as you slide it through the latch loop. You open the hatch. Creamy walls, dirty brown handrails, and a crummy carpet stretch away down flights of stairs. Down and down you go until at last you see the door at the bottom of a final flight of stairs. Taking one more lung grab at extra oxygen, you advance. The door opens easily, and in you go.
There she is. You die.
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