Ella’s P. O. V.
“Here’s where you’ll be staying.”
Jai opened the bedroom door and pulled my suitcase inside the room for me. I followed him inside and cringed The room was huge, just like the rest of the place. The ceiling was at least fifty feet tall. The dark paneling on the walls made the olive-colored curtains stand out, which hung beside a ginormous bay window that was in the center of the far wall.
One of the biggest beds I’d ever laid eyes on sat against the wall to my left. It had a four post bed frame that was a dark oak just like the paneling on the walls and the flooring.
The black duvet matched the pillows on the bed and the two black couches that were on the other side of the room.
The Victorian-style couches sat across from each other in front of a fireplace that was big enough for three grown men to stand beside each other inside it.
“Over there is your bathroom,” Jai said, pointing to a door that was on the same wall as the fireplace.
We heard someone walk into the room and I turned around to see Daniel standing in the doorway.
“Like it?” He asked.
I looked awkwardly between Daniel and Jai.
“Guys, this room is huge. Beautiful, but huge. Do you not have anything smaller?” Jai shook his head.
“None that aren’t already being used,” he said.
I caught a fleeting glimpse of confusion on Daniel’s face as he looked at Jai, but it was gone just as quickly as it had come.
“You can settle in a little later” Daniel said. “I want you to come with me.”
Daniel led the way out of the room and Jai followed us closely, closing the bedroom door behind us as we left.
“Okay, so you’re going to meet the girl that Cain told you had a paper trail together for the other men this had happened to; Daniel said.
“Thing is, she doesn’t really know what she’s doing,
so we’re replacing her with you.”
“What makes you think I know what I’m doing?” I asked.
Daniel laughed. “Trust me,” he said. “This girl has a total of four brain cells. Dogs could do a better job.”
“Then why did she get the job in the first place?” I asked.
“Question of the century,” Jai chimed in.
Daniel rolled his eyes. “Look, she’s hot,” he said to me. “I didn’t know when I met her that she could barely spell her name or else I wouldn’t have
given her that job.”
We walked along the long hallway and I looked at the paintings and tapestries that were hung on the wall as we passed them. We finally arrived at the threshold of an open doorway and walked in to see a platinum-haired girl standing beside a table
that had five file boxes sitting on it.
“You haven’t even opened them?!” Daniel yelled.
The girl turned to look at us, her phone in hand. “No,” she said, as if it didn’t matter.
Daniel groaned and slapped his forehead with his palm. “Cain is going to kill me,” he said under his breath.
“Arra, this is Ella. Ella, this is Arra,” Jai said, introducing us while Daniel fought a migraine.
“Hi,” she said, waving. I waved back.
“She’s taking your job,” Daniel told her.
“Oh, thank God!” She said, throwing her hands up in the air.
Her reaction surprised me, seeing as people don’t normally celebrate once they’ve fired.
“Word of advice,” she said, her face getting serious as she warned me, “I’m convinced these men you’re looking for turned into zombies. Your only job should be to warn these guys so we can get prepared for the apocalypse.”
She was dead serious.
“Zombies eat brains, Arra. You’re safe,” Daniel said, moving her out of the room.
I had to stop myself from laughing.
She waved goodbye, either ignoring or not noticing Daniel’s comment. “My I. Q. just dropped four points,” he said sighing as we watched her walk away.
Jai pushed past us and walked over to the files.
He handed Daniel and I each a box.
“Let’s start unpacking these,” he said.
“Don’t bother.”
The voice came from behind us and we turned to see Cain in the doorway.
“We’re moving this stuff to my office,” he said, walking into the room.
Cain turned his attention to me. “You’ll be able to concentrate more in there. It’s quiet.”
I don’t know about that, buddy.
Just looking at the guy made me lose my train of thought. I doubted being in the same room as him would equal higher productivity for me.
“O… kay,” Daniel said awkwardly, placing the lid back on the box.
We each grabbed a box and Cain walked over and grabbed two. thought I heard Daniel mumble something about him showing off as he did so.
We carried the boxes down a few hallways and came to a large wooden door. Cain pushed it open with his shoulder and it revealed a spiraling staircase that went up.
We all filed in behind Cain as he led the way up the broad staircase. At the top, the staircase opened up to a large room with bookshelves lining the walls. There were at least three large desks in this room, one of which I assumed was Cain’s as it was
covered in papers, pens, and file folders.
“You can use this desk,” Cain said, placing his two boxes down on it.
I placed my box beside his. My breath caught in my throat as his hand touched mine to help lift the lid on the box. I certainly didn’t need the help, but I
wasn’t going to tell him that. I reached across the desk and turned on a lamp that sat on the corner.
This room was dark, just like the train. There were no windows, just lamps that sat around the room strategically to provide light. Cain walked over to his desk and grabbed the box that I had brought which contained my grandfather’s information.
He brought the box back over to my desk. As he sat the box down, he looked at me and we shared a prolonged moment of eye contact that left me struggling to remember my name.
“Let’s see what we have here,” Daniel said, pulling a piece of paper from his box and simultaneously pulling me out of my trance.
I listened as Daniel read off the name of the man whose information was on the sheet of paper in his hands but I was more focused on the fact that Cain had walked around the desk and had come to stand right next to me.
We were so close I couldn’t have moved an inch to my left before I was leaning on him. Cain reached around me and grabbed something from one of the
boxes on the desk. His arm brushed mine as he did so and I felt shivers erupt down my arms and my spine.
“Ella, does that description match your grandfather?”
What?
“I’m a visual person,” I said quickly. “Can I just read it?”
Why didn’t you just scream: ” I wasn’t listening!”
Daniel handed me the paper and I read over everything that I had missed. It was a copy of a medical form that I assumed was filled out by
another man that went missing. Reading his age, height, weight, and preexisting heart condition
made me feel like I was reading my own grandfather’s information.
They were nearly identical in every aspect.
“What do you think this means?” I asked Cain.
“It’s odd for sure, but I don’t know,” he said, taking the paper from me to read it.
I opened the box in front of me, curious to see what else there was to find. I pulled out a few sheets of paper from my box and examined them closely.
Immediately I noticed something strange.
“Wait…” I said slowly.
I looked at the familiar hospital logo in the corner of one of the papers. “This guy went to the same place for a blood transfusion as my grandfather” I said.
Cain and Jai both leaned over and looked at the logo that I was pointing at. “Look and see if the other men did,” I instructed. “Maybe that’s an important connection.”
We each began to look though the other boxes and files of all the men who had disappeared
“This guy went there,” Daniel said
“This one too.” Jai added.
All the ones I had looked at had at least one paper in their file that revealed they had been to the same hospital.
A thought that I hadn’t considered before struck me suddenly.
“Wait, if they were all from the same area, why would it matter that they went to the same hospital? It’s a small town, I would wager that most people in that town went to that hospital.”
“I would agree with you,” Jai said, “But considering that they could all be doppelgängers for one another based on their CBC reports, I think it’s more than a coincidence.”
Cain nodded in agreement. “They all lived alone. None of them held a consistent job; some were retired others had been fired or quit. Also important to note that none of them were married or had live-in partners. There was no one to immediately notice they had gone missing.”
It was true.