MInTheGap Fiction Fiction Writing from MInTheGap

Hostages – Page 5

“And no one has the phone number?”

“That’s right also.”

“Then it’s settled. You take Tricia down to her room and get her a change of clothes, and I’ll take Laura to her house and do the same.” I talked the girls into it and took Tricia down to her room, my arm around her to keep her from shaking. We got the clothes and went to the office. I had two sleeping bags among the college accessories I had bought before leaving, and so did Noah. I moved the desks in each room. One room was designated ‘Hers’, the other ‘His.’ Noah and I were to sleep in my inner office, because of the big windows. The girls slept in the outer, because it had only the window between the offices, which was curtained. With this arrangement we all went to sleep.

The next morning, Noah got up and awoke me. We quickly got dressed and shut the shutters tight. The girls were still asleep. “I don’t think that we’ll be able to sleep in our own apartments until Michelle is found.”

“Sure. But how are we going to find her?”

“I don’t know.” I thought for a moment. “Did Matt and Noelle see you yesterday?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“Then I have a plan. Here’s what we do. Tomorrow, Tricia and I dress in black and paint ourselves black. You and Laura, go to the front of the house and get Noelle and Matt to come to the front, while we sneak in the back. We’ll look around and see if we can find Michelle. If we can, and can get her out safely, we will. Otherwise, we’ll leave, and come back some other time.”

“Why not tonight?”

“Tonight they will be looking for a rescue attempt. We have to look like we are not even going to try.”

“Good thinking.”

“Hey, I just had another idea.”

“What?”

“Why don’t you, Mr. Inventor, invent some way of communication for us for tomorrow. You and Laura can stay here and work on it while Tricia and I pretend to do our normal, daily things, like . . . VOLLEYBALL!”

“Hey, why don’t you get a real sport, like basketball?”

“I like volleyball.” Then it hit me. It was almost time to play. I quickly awoke Tricia, and got into the car. We dashed back and hurried to the gym where the game was ready to start. Unfortunately we were swept, 5-0. This really made things bad. We changed, first Tricia in hers, while I waited in her living room, then I in mine. We did the thing I dreaded the most, to try to calm her down, we went to the mall. We shopped all day. It was night time and I decided that it was time to go back to the office. We had to stop by her house first to drop off all the things she had bought.

I bought a game called Rook, while I was at the mall, and we spent the night trying to figure out how to play the game. We each retired to our separate rooms. After I was sure that the girls were asleep, I woke Noah and we discussed the plan in detail. We synchronized our watches and tested the transmitting device he had come up with. Laura would go to the door, pretending to be selling encyclopedias. She would keep the two of them occupied while Noah stayed in the car monitoring our progress. Laura would be told the second that she could leave. I would be wearing the transmitting device to contact Noah if we ran into trouble. He had also obtained a copy of the floor plans of the building so I could study them. We were ready.