A Place Called Freedom (1995)

The crowd was bigger, and there were more fire engines and police cars, but she still could not see Lisa. It seemed almost certain that she was still in the burning building. A sense of doom crept over Jeannie, and she fought it. You can’t just let this happen! she told herself.

She spotted the fire officer she had spoken to earlier. She grabbed his arm. “I’m almost certain Lisa Hoxton is in there,” she said frantically. “I’ve looked everywhere for her.”

He gave her a hard look and seemed to decide she was reliable. Without answering her, he put a two-way radio to his mouth and spoke into it. “Look out for a young white female believed to be inside the building, named Lisa, repeat, Lisa.”

“Thank you,” Jeannie said.

He nodded curtly and strode away.

Jeannie was glad he had listened to her, but still she could not rest. She remembered the maintenance man saying there was another entrance to the basement. She turned and ran around to the back again.

The hatch was set into the ground close to the building, partly hidden by a gray Chrysler New Yorker. The steel trapdoor was open, leaning against the building wall. Jeannie knelt by the square hole and leaned down to look inside.

A ladder led down to a dirty room lit by fluorescent tubes. She could see machinery and lots of pipes. There were wisps of smoke in the air, but not thick clouds: it must be closed off from the rest of the basement. Nevertheless, the smell of smoke reminded her of how she had coughed and choked as she searched blindly for the staircase, and she felt her heart beat faster at the memory.

“Is anybody there?” she called.

She thought she heard a sound, but she could not be sure. She shouted louder. “Hello?” There was no reply.

She hesitated. The sensible thing to do would be to return to the front of the building and grab a fireman, but that could take too long, especially if the fireman decided to question her. The alternative was to go down the ladder and take a look.

The thought of reentering the building made her legs weak. Her chest still hurt from the violent spasms of coughing caused by the smoke. But Lisa might be down there. She could be hurt and unable to move, or trapped by a fallen timber, or just passed out from the fumes. She had to look.

She steeled her nerve and put a foot on the ladder. Her knees felt weak and she almost fell. She hesitated. After a moment she felt strong, and she took a step down. Then a breath of smoke caught in her throat, making her cough, and she climbed out again.

When she had stopped coughing she tried again.

She went down one rung, then two. If the smoke makes me cough, I’ll just come right out again, she told herself. The third step was easier, and after that she went down quickly, jumping off the last rung onto the concrete floor.

She found herself in a big room full of pumps and filters, presumably for the swimming pool. The smell of smoke was strong, but she could breathe normally.

She saw Lisa right away, and the sight made her gasp.

She was lying on her side, curled up in a fetal position, naked. There was a smear of what looked like blood on her thigh. She was not moving. Jeannie shouted: “Lisa!” She heard the shrill overtone of hysteria in her own voice, and took a breath to keep calm. She made her way across the room, through the tangle of pipework, and knelt beside her friend. “Lisa?”

Lisa opened her eyes.

“Thank God,” Jeannie said. “I thought you were dead.”

Slowly Lisa sat up. She would not look at Jeannie. Her lips were bruised. “He raped me,” she said.