Page 85 of The Staircase in the Woods

“All right,” Nick said. “I’m gonna hop in, hop out—”

“Nick.”

“What?”

“The body.”

“The body?” Nick turned back toward the attic and looked. “Oh shit.”

The body was gone.

The mattress sat there, filthy with stains, but bare of anybody or anything.

“Yeah. Shit.”

“Maybe that’s a good thing. It’s gone. Right?”

“I…” Owen didn’t have an answer. It seemed like that could be true. Though in this place, that didn’t seem likely. “I don’t know, Nick. But I think we should both step through. You go first, and I’ll be right on your heels.”

Nick batted his eyes. “We could hold hands, sweetie.”

“Don’t be homophobic.”

“I’m not.” He scoffed. “I’m actually kinda serious.”

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

Owen reached out, took Nick’s hand. It was cold and clammy. But welcome just the same.

“Let’s Thelma and Louise this shit.”

Nick stepped through, Owen right behind him.

The air in the attic room was immediately different—it smelled like, well, an old attic. Like dust, mostly. It was still and stale. And behind it was something else, too: the pickled smell of death, like roadkill you passed in your car, its stink crawling up through the heating vents.

Owen scanned the room, looking for the strange sheet-swaddled body that had been on the mattress—thatsat upbefore. But nothing.

Still, the skin on the back of his neck prickled.

“Let’s go back,” Owen said.

Nick nodded like he was vibing it, too.

Owen stepped backward through the door, and Nick came through with him, shutting the door as they did. Nick said, “All right, let’s see if it—”

But as he spoke, he turned to look at Owen—

Owen, who was still facing Nick and the door.

Nick’s eyes went wide as he stared past Owen.

Oh fuck.

Owen spun.

There, on the little microfiber loveseat—

Was the swaddled body.

---