Failure To Communicate: Part III

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After standing up and dusting myself off, I took stock of the situation. There were two ways out of the basement that did not involve the use of a key, but one was blocked by enormous rats, and the other was only accessible by a route that led me right through the boiler room. I had never been within 20 feet of this room, since I had seen it from a distance, and knew that there was a bottomless pit beneath the boiler. Any five year old boy knows that skeletons live in bottomless pits, and they only long to drag you toward unknown horror if you give them the chance. In this case, however, the skeletons were less of a threat than the rats, because the rats already knew I was there, and I could probably sneak past the skeletons if I was careful.

I crept to the end of the hall trying to see down into the pit below the boiler. There was a glimmer of bone white behind one of the supports that I could see. I would be spotted as soon as I entered the room. Skeletons are slower than rats though, so I decided to make a break for it. I tore across the room and slammed into the metal bar which opened the latch for the outer door. I pushed on it, hard, and the tight hydraulic pump on the top fought against me for a moment - giving the skeletons enough time to crawl out from under the boiler and rise behind me. I slid out into the alley and pushed the door closed again - they did not have time to reach the door before it latched closed. Hopefully they would not be able to figure out the latch on their own, but I made a point of not delaying in the alley for long, just in case. I wouldn't be able to open this door again anyways, as it had no handle on the outside. I quickly swallowed the regret in the back of my mind. By not looking over my shoulder, I may have passed up a rare chance to see live skeletons in their natural habitat.

Looking around I could see a pretty simple choice ahead. I could wade through trash and step in gooey yuck to get to the back wall, risking dark shadow that might contain more skeletons or rats, with no guarantee of an exit in that direction, or I could quickly slip over the barbed wire fence and walk around the building to the front door. 45 seconds later, I was hopelessly entangled in a coil of razor wire, with minor lacerations all over my body and still no one in sight. It was after midnight, and Morningside Park emanated a thin criminal stink from across the street. This was where the upper west side went for illegal powders of all kinds. As a five year old, I knew only that I was not to talk to anyone who came out of that park, or to ever play there. In addition to having been told not to play there, I was also prevented from playing there by the large stainless steel blades perforating my pajamas.




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