"In Thin Air" - Installment One: The Basement
PREFACE
During the Victorian era, “penny magazines”—often called penny dreadfuls—revolutionized storytelling. These serialized thrillers were sold in weekly installments for just a penny, bringing suspenseful tales to the working class and transforming fiction from an elite luxury into an affordable pastime for the masses.
Today, in the Information Age—somewhere between TikTok scrolls and rapidly shrinking attention spans—I’m resurrecting the spirit of the penny dreadful. But this time, it’s completely free, delivered right here on my blog.
So without further ado… (drumroll please)
Welcome to my first serialized short story of "In Thin Air":
Installment One
The Basement
The basement light hums before it fully turns on.
Not flickering — just thinking about it.
Caroline’s halfway down the stairs when she smells it. Not
rot. Not mildew. Just something… unfinished. Concrete and dust and cold air
that doesn’t circulate.
Daniel’s right behind her, close enough that she can feel
his warmth through her sweater.
“Careful,” he says lightly. “The last step’s a doozy.”
She registers that.
The last step’s uneven and wobbles a bit.
The room opens wider than she expects. Low ceiling. Exposed
beams. A single rather harsh light. A stack of crates against
one wall with yearbooks, pictures, memorabilia. A stationary bike with a
large screen television.
And then — the mattress.
It’s pushed against the far wall, directly on the concrete.
No frame.
No sheets.
No pillow.
Just a bare mattress, slightly indented in the middle.
She stops walking.
He doesn’t.
“Oh, yeah,” he says, following her line of sight. “I’m
redoing the guest room. Haven’t gotten around to it.”
Guest room.
She nods.
“Why is it down here?”
"Why is what down here?" he asks.
"The guestroom?"
He shrugs, easy. “Cooler in the summer.”
He steps toward it, squats down and presses his palm against the surface
like he’s proving its innocence. “This guy is temporary.”
Temporary.
Her body doesn’t feel temporary about it.
The air feels different near it. Still. Contained.
She forces a small laugh. “Very minimalist of you.”
“Yeah,” he smiles. “Very serial killer chic.”
He says it jokingly.
She laughs.
Because that’s what you do when someone says something like
that.
You laugh.
She walks closer. The concrete is colder here. There’s a
faint scuff mark on the wall at mattress height. Probably from moving it.
Probably.
“Anyway,” he says, already turning toward the stairs. “You
hungry?”
She takes one last look at the room.
There is nothing visibly wrong.
No chains.
No stains.
No horror movie theatrics.
Just a mattress on a basement floor. Weird.
Her chest tightens anyway.
She tells herself it’s just the altitude. The thin air.
And follows him upstairs.
Comments
Post a Comment