Perfect (Rewrite)

Chapter Sixty Two

    Chloe woke up back in her room without a clue as of to how she had gotten there. She rubbed her aching head and then remembered what had happened to Jacob; she glanced to the end of her bed and saw the book she had taken from the hidden room. After deciding it was best to keep it hidden, even though someone must've known about it, she slid it in between the mattress and the boxspring of her bed. Then Chloe raced out of her room, down the stairs, and into the kitchen. The key in her pocket opened the padlock, but the floorboard wouldn't budge any higher than a couple inches off the ground. She pulled and pulled, trying to free Jacob from his imprisoned state, but gave up after someone placed their hand on her shoulder.

    David said, "It's no use. We already tried."

    She didn't want to give up though; she wanted to pull up on the floorboard until the end of time, and she would've if David hadn't started moving the kitchen table back into its place. Chloe backed out of his way and then sat in her chair, stared at the wood on the cabinets, straight through where Jacob should've been sitting. Margaret joined them in the kitchen, her arm was bruised badly, blacker than any skin she had ever seen before.

    "What happened to you?" David asked.

    "I walked into a door."

    David shoved his chair away and stomped up the stairs in a rage.

    "Why are you making excuses for him?" Chloe asked. Margaret stared at the floor, her bottom lip hidden in her mouth, her eyes uneasy and red. "We can't do this without you."

    "It's not going to work," Margaret repeated. "It's only going to make things worse."

    "You don't know that."

    "Yes I do."

    "How?"

    "He told me."

    Margaret's words stopped Chloe in her tracks; she backtracked to her room, locked the door, and sat on her bed. She punched her pillow twice, wishing it was him, wishing she could make him feel the pain he had made her feel. First he took away Rachel, which wasn't really a problem for Chloe. Then he took away Melanie and Collin; he had crossed the point of no return. Finally, Jacob was trapped, dead for all she knew, and there was nothing she could do to save him. The floorboard wouldn't give and there was no other way down there. Was there?

    Chloe looked around her room and checked the floor for any hidden crevices like in the kitchen. There were none, so she checked Melanie and Jacob's rooms; then she checked Margaret's. Same results, nothing. It took a while to finally click in her head, checking the second floor wouldn't help her get two stories down. She barreled down the steps and searched every panel of wood, scooted the couch and chairs, making sure there wasn't any hidden passageway.

    David helped Chloe after he came back downstairs, his hair was a mess again, and his knuckles had fresh blood on them. Margaret watched them from the kitchen, hoping they would find something, anything, yet at the same time praying they didn't. She kept saying over and over, "It's only going to make things worse."

    They gave up in their search after each of them had covered every piece of floor, no luck in either of the rooms. David fell on the couch, and Chloe plopped down beside him. "There's nothing," He said. "There for a moment, I actually thought we would find something."

    "I did too."

    Margaret entered the room and sat down in the middle of the couch in between them; they stared at the blank screen.

    "Smile," He whispered into each of their ears, but they didn't do as they were told. They couldn't; he had already taken all hope away from them. There wasn't much more he could do. "Smile."