“Not unless you want to eat melted volleyballs.”
“Kind of was hoping for something tastier.” Reyva gestured toward the house. “It’s pointless to hope anything survived in the kitchen.”
“Well, the kitchen didn’t survive, so I’d say you’re right.” Maybe if they could move the chunks of collapsed roof, they’d be able to identify which room was the kitchen, but that would take much more time and energy than they had to spare. Plus she was still hesitant to explore the house itself. “As soon as Mariana finishes with her SOS, we should head back to the lake and boil as much water as we can.”
The sooner they began their hike, the sooner they’d reach civilization. She didn’t have time to be distracted by little oddities like a trapdoor inside a shed.
“Trying hard not to think about water,” Reyva said.
“I want to try to find some containers so we can carry it,” Claire said. The toolbox could work for boiling, but it would be awkward to carry on a hike if it were full of water. “Let me know if you see anything else odd. There’s something about this place that doesn’t feel right.”
“Hmm, could it be the fact that it was burned to the ground?” Reyva drawled.
Claire wrinkled her nose at Reyva. She couldn’t put her finger on exactly what the problem was, but the place looked run-down in addition to the fire damage. She’d expected a newly renovated camp to be, well, renovated.
She crossed back to the sheds to search the third one—the last one, really, since the fourth shed had fully collapsed into ash and rubble. Poking her head inside, she saw the floor was covered in shattered glass and pottery shards. Most of the shelves had buckled and fallen, taking with them a supply of mason jars and clay flowerpots, but one shelf had survived the destruction. The other shelves had fallen at angles around it, protecting it, and there were at least ten whole glass jam jars with screw-on lids. Perfect for holding water.
Broken glass crunched under her shoes as she stepped gingerly over it. Pausing in the center of the room, she swept the glass aside with her feet. She studied the floorboards for a moment. No trapdoor in this shed. Just in the other one. It nagged at her, like an unsolved brainteaser.
Why was there a trapdoor, and where did it lead? Clearly, it had been intentionally hidden, which was a strange choice if it just led to an extra storage area. What if—
Reyva stuck her head into the shed. “Claire? Mariana’s done with the SOS. Did you find—ah, jars!” Stepping over the glass, she retrieved five of them. Claire picked up another four and carried them out to the lawn.
They joined up with Mariana.
Waving one of the jars in the air, Reyva said, “Look what Claire found.”
Mariana oohed and aahed over the jars appropriately, and Reyva praised her SOS, which dominated the airstrip but wasn’t obvious from ground level unless you knew what you were looking at. “Since it’s such a quality SOS, I think that’s a vote in favor of staying,” Mariana said. “There’s a chance someone will see it and rescue us.”
“Still two votes for hiking our way out of here,” Reyva said. “Especially now that Claire has found the supplies we need to avoid dehydration.”
“Actually...,” Claire said, her thoughts solidifying into what felt like almost a certainty. “I think we should stay a little longer.”
“What? Why?” Reyva asked. “You’re the one who said—”
“It’s possible the others aren’t all dead.” She turned to face the shed with the trapdoor. “I think they could be hiding. Underground.”
Five
Together, they tried to pry up the trapdoor.
Squatting, Claire positioned herself between Reyva and Mariana. She dug her fingers beneath the lip of the lid. “On three? One, two—”
“Love when people interrupt the countdown to ask if it’s on three or after,” Mariana commented. “Like, a trillion movies have noticed it’s a problem, but still there’s no standard.”
Reyva rolled her eyes. “Seriously, Mariana?”
“It’s perpetually funny.”
“Actually isn’t,” Reyva said.
“Just trying to lighten the mood. My therapist says I hide under humor and bravado. I told her I’m just naturally this charming, and it’s her issue that I intimidate her.”
Claire didn’t intend to laugh, but she did—it came out as a warbling squawk. She swallowed it quickly, but Mariana beamed at her. Claire gave her a tentative smile back.
If she had to be stuck in this nightmare with two strangers, at least she was with these two. Of course, she gave them about half a day before they decided they were sick of her. She wasnotgoodunder stress. Unlike Reyva, whom nothing fazed. And Mariana, who switched from distraught to cheerful with lightning speed. “Onthree. One, two,three.”
They lifted, but the trapdoor didn’t budge.
