Callback

“Hey Zoey?” Gavin’s voice was muffled, echoing through the hall from downstairs.
“Yeah?” She turned away from the window to call back, then waited for a reply. None came.
She held still to listen better; maybe Gavin was too far to hear. This wooden house was still strange to Zoey. She didn’t know which of its creaks came from what stair or floorboard. She missed knowing who was where just by listening, like she did on the Chancer. All the lights being out weren’t helping her spatial awareness either.
“Yeah?!” she repeated, louder.
“Hey Zoey!” the spacer called again.
This place was eating her replies before they reached him, she decided. Leaving the VISR binoculars on the sill, she swung her sneakers off the bed and hurried through the door.
She slowed quickly in the upstairs hall. Zoey tried to navigate using the faint shapes of shadows on the wall. But in the unfamiliar dark with her eyes adjusting, it was like trying to navigate by making up her own constellations or interpreting clouds.
She stopped, afraid of missing the top step—but then her hand found the railing. There was security in the landmark. It let her make an educated guess where the first stair was, and a concrete handhold to grip if she guessed wrong.
Still waiting for her eyes to adjust, she called out again. “Gavin?”
“Hey Zoey, come down here!”
This time, she pinpointed it. His voice was coming from the deck, just outside the door next to the foot of the stairs. Bluish moonlight coming from the windows started filling her vision with details between the deeper shadows. Confident she could see well enough, Zoey started downstairs. She took mental note of the rhythm made by each subsequent creak.
As she neared the bottom, a feeling slowed her down. When had Gavin stepped outside? She hadn’t heard the front door open. The way it slammed in its frame when they first came in, Zoey was sure she'd have heard it upstairs.
She wondered if she’d gone too long without a reply. “Gav?”
No answer.
“Gavin?”
He used the stern captain's voice reserved for when she was really in trouble. “Get out here. Now.”
Immediately humbled, Zoey tossed her silly hesitation away like a proper cabin girl and reached for the door handle. Her forefinger brushed the lock—
“Zoey?”
She recoiled as if she'd touched a hot stove. Zoey spun to face where the sound of her name had come from.
Leaning into the hall through the kitchen door, glancing at her in puzzlement, was Gavin. “You call me?”
Category:The Weekly
Category:Haloween