Exasperated breathing and torrential darkness. They were best friends during those moments. I remember it so vividly.
The quick slurping of that rich, rich oxygen that feels so sparse when your brain is signaling “BREATHE dammit” produces a haunting sound. Especially when it’s coming from someone else. Whether it comes from a friend or stranger, when you hear that sound, you know something is awry.
Trying to remember that dark, dark night is an odd thing. I’m trying to remember something that I can’t really draw, only describe. It should have no shape but still, it elicits raw feelings. When I think about what I experienced, the nondescript void is anything but shapeless and hungry. It’s eerily distinguishable. It’s unlike the total darkness of your bathroom or bedroom at night. Although I could nearly replicate the absence of light, I couldn’t replicate the consuming feeling of that basement. Chalk it up to my brain telling me I have nothing to fear sitting in my dark apartment when compared to the basement. Probably true.
A group of friends and I found an abandoned 6-story building decaying among a thriving neighborhood. For fear that this building still stands, I’ll keep its location and some details hidden to prevent any urban explorers from hazarding themselves.
The building was fixed in the middle of a rectangular plot of land that held an old parking lot and forgotten landscaping. On all sides, it was cut off by roads with houses situated right across. It did not stand alone, yet it stood abruptly. This building leaned proudly on its dilapidated canes. You’d think a midwestern winter would do the building in but it survived. Not sternly, yet it held its own. With all the windows boarded up, the soul of the building was kept hidden from the neighbors. Most of the folks who lived around the area moved in after the building was abandoned so they only know it as a relic of the past. Like an old oak, it wore its age on its surface but everyone was curious, what stories could be told hidden underneath the bark.
I say that to justify what we did. It’s an interesting thing how some assume curiosity ends at questioning rather than finding the answer. At the same time, not everything needs an answer especially when the pursuit of it turns a jog into a marathon.
Anxiety, curiosity, and stupidity, all amplified by whatever drugs we could find, led us to peeling that bark off. We planned to break into the facility by cutting the fence where it meets the side rail to hide the damage. After we pulled the fence back, we used a crowbar and a screwdriver to remove the plywood over the windows. We made sure to be as quiet as possible to not rouse the suspicion of the neighbors and local police.
The building stood tall but we did not have any plans beyond getting inside since we didn’t know what to expect. Once inside, the main floor was illuminated by strands of moonlight and the weak light we had from our phones. The first generation Iphones did not have flashlights so we used max brightness apps to illuminate the space.
We fumbled about the main floor exploring the many rooms and corridors. We found and sprayed each other with expired extinguishers (not realizing how they fight fires), tagged the walls with our names (genius move), and investigated any nooks we could.
Eventually, we found a staircase that only led down. With the absence of the moon’s illumination, the abyss sat there, beckoning us to let curiosity cloud our judgment. With 4 phones, we started the trek down the crumbling stone steps. For something man-made, the environment could not feel more ethereal.
As we stumbled about, we eventually realized the basement expanded out further than the floors above. The foundation was square with one long hallway heading eastward. This wasn’t a cause for immediate concern but we quickly pieced together that if something were to happen, there is probably no exit up. Rather, the only exit is to go all the way back to where we started. If somehow there were stairs that led up, we’d surely end up on someone’s property as the field that laid beyond the building was devoid of any entries.
As we trudged along the limb-like hallway we found more rooms on its branches. Rooms that held maintenance equipment, offices, sprawling bathrooms, and labs. The floors were littered with paint chips, like leaves in the fall. They’d snip off, eager to feel the ground, at any slight breeze.
While perusing, I pondered the conversations that occurred in these rooms, the advances in medicine found, gossip shared, heart break felt, and long days within that concrete tomb. Life lived there once as we can only imagine, but we only felt the absence of it in the present.
We sank deeper into the corridor and soon approached a Y intersection. There was standing water in both directions. The floors leading down the corridors must’ve had a slight decline to it to pool all the water. The lake that slept before us went further than the light we could cast. Unsurprisingly, it brought the heavy stench of garbage roasting on a humid day.
We stopped in the water when it was probably an inch or two deep. There existed in the atmosphere the overwhelming consensus that we will not walk further. With all of our lips upturned, our noses pinched, and stone feet, we didn’t have to use words to convey how we felt. Yet, with our silent votes cast, we didn’t accept the results. We talked, listed pro’s and con’s (to which there were no pro’s), and debated going further. It must’ve been the drugs that did the heavy lifting to convince us because I still don’t know how we decided to venture forth.
We took the route to the right because why not. As we slogged through that ink-dark syrup, that nature would have you believe is water, it rose up past our knees. We stayed silent through our walk, only opening our mouths to curse. We knew we fucked up and prayed that we avoid any infection. As our hands waved and did a dance above our head to keep us balanced, the light emitted from our phone acted as a strobe light by sporadically spraying its beams on parts of the corridor. The water did its best to not reflect the light. None of us were interested in staring down, only forward. We thought we walked a mile, but it couldn’t have been more than 100 feet.
Out of water and on dryer land, we caught our breath and audibly let out a unified “Fuck”. Not only for getting out but realizing that to return, we would have to go through it all over again. I’m thinking fuck that as I write this out.
We marched forward and saw a set of closed double doors with a placard labeled “Cafeteria” to the right. Locked or not, we had the means and body power to go through it so we set off to it. The doors, as if eager to be touched, glided open at the touch of a finger. A concentrated blow could’ve knocked it off its hinges it seemed. With both doors opened, the sheer darkness immediately swallowed us.
We stood timidly, with our 4 electronic candles hardly helping, lost to the vastness of night entombed within that space. It seemed almost darker with our lights on. There was no way to visualize how big the room was or what we were walking into aside from using our imagination.
We took a step inside and were quickly overwhelmed. The doors fell shut behind us as we moved towards, what we hoped would be, the center of the room. Water still stood a couple of inches high in this room but was more puddle-like than swamp. As we walked further, we noticed rectangular lunch tables were oddly set up in a seemingly deliberate maze-like fashion. We snaked around the tables, heading hopefully towards the end.
We communicated chiefly through our breathing that night. Slow, silent draws of air through our noses, displayed our calmness. Quick, deep, mouthfuls, showed the exact opposite. The sound of our splashing feet was interrupted by heavier and quicker breathing taken in unison.
We noticed, simultaneously, that someone set up food trays at each table. Where they were sporadically sitting on the table at the start of the maze, they were now deliberately set and squared away. Each was ~6 inches from the edge and there was ~6 inches between each tray. As if ghosts still needed their lunch breaks.
Sadness, not fear, was the first feeling that coursed through me upon seeing them set about. What was once, is no more, type of thoughts. Nothing profound but slightly depressing nonetheless. A genius prank from someone who found a stack of trays hidden in the kitchen, we surmised.
We kept our pace and came to an opening, which we assumed was the center of the room and there was nothing. Not even water, which seemed to be everywhere else in the room. The ground was smoother in the center and felt like we were walking on the tile just like on the main floor.
We didn’t come to check out the landscape so we went straight ahead and encountered another maze of lunch tables. Mind you, we could’ve very very easily climbed on top of these tables, as they didn’t stand tall. But with terrible lighting, wet shoes, slimy tables, and standing water on the ground, the chance of us slipping and falling off the table and landing in it was deterrent enough for us to stay grounded.
At this point, two of our phones died in the cafeteria. Turns out, using your front screen as a flashlight burns through the battery pretty rapidly. With one light positioned at the front and one at the back, we snaked throughout the other maze
We eventually found ourselves at the serving area/kitchen. We took a small break and stared back across from where we came. It was a futile attempt and quite comical in the moment. Unsurprisingly, we saw nothing. Light only lit a few feet ahead of us. Beyond that, nothing. Pitch black. Knowing light hasn’t been down here in years. Knowing that if we got stuck down here, we’d have to claw our way out as no one would hear us this deep in the bowels. I never felt closer to isolation than standing there with my three friends.
That’s when we heard a creak and felt the slightly rotten but freezing exhale glide from the doors to where we were standing. The air was still, prior to that point. We instinctively went silent and hid our lights, the hunters being hunted.
I whispered “What the fuck was that?”.
The doors shut softly.
I whispered, trying to calm the tension, “If something’s there, at least it would have to walk through water, which would be loud.”
Scrambling, fumbling for any ounce of reassurance, I fucked up. Maybe there’s always a breeze down here but I just put the thought into the air that there is something there.
Mouth breathing commenced. That putrid and humid trash, that lived on molecules suspended in the air, danced on our tongues. We didn’t have time to let that be a concern. We ran behind the serving counter, which landed us in the kitchen.
With a clear barrier between us and the cafeteria, we waited for anything. Movement, sound, anything. Our wishes were granted.
A confusing sound echoes throughout the room that lasted very briefly. It sounded like someone tried to skip a rock on the pavement. Suddenly, we heard the splash and the calculations in our brains were working overtime to deduce what caused those sounds. Only plausible cause was something kicked a food tray and it skipped across the table until it landed in the water….
…fuck. Whatever IT is, it’s walking across the tables. We won’t hear its soaking stomps through that pond.
Armed with nothing except a screwdriver and a crowbar, we weren’t exactly defenseless. However, even with a gun, when the only description of your enemy is the abyss, a weapon is useless.
Instantly, we turned and prayed for an exit somewhere in the kitchen. Any handle we could find, we tried to rip it open. Our panting turned animalistic. We bloodied our knuckles and jammed our fingers trying to grip anything in the near darkness. Doors led to small pantries or rusted cabinets. Eventually, we made our way to the old cooler.
We regrouped in the old cooler.
Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid idea in recollection. Faulty locks, broken hinges, anything could’ve turned that basement into our forever home. But it was either hide or fight with fleeting light. Hiding was the most sensible solution. We turned the phones down to a minimum and waited. And waited, and waited. Nothing.
You could probably smell the courage it took for us to open that cooler seep through our pores. Ready to kill, we slid it open to nothing. Just darkness. We stared out from within and waited.
We listened and listened close and heard nothing except for our near rhythmic breathing. Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, exhale,inhale. The breathing pace began to slow, as we all instinctively did not want our fear to show to the others.
Staying in that cooler any longer was simply not an option. We didn’t walk, but we fucking ran through that maze. In a single file line, as quickly as possible, the splashing of the water coupled with our panting created the most sinister symphony that those walls have ever heard. It was impossible to tell where the noises were coming from as they echoed off every cursed surface in that room.
We quickly encountered the dry center and all tripped and covered ourselves in that syrup. Screaming, panting, and spitting that nasty water out added extra instruments. We reached the second maze and made it to the end. I got near the entrance door, exasperated and elated to leave and leaned to push it open.
I fell through immediately, as if I pushed on a curtain of black mist, and hit the ground hard. Like when you have a dream where you hit the ground, I felt weightless for a second. Quite a second that was, as it felt like an eternity, and I was quickly met with sudden pain.
My phone shot out of my hand and shattered, deleting any light that was in the immediate area. I yelped and my friends were stuck in near darkness since I was the one who led the charge through. Soaking, battered, tired, and scared, they helped me up. My phone lay asleep in an inch of water at this point.
I came to my senses and in the moment, I was the only one who noticed that the doors were open. They were locked in place with their kickstands down.
Did we do this? Did one of us?
With no time to sit and ponder, we started our journey across the knee-deep channel. Without light, I hugged the wall that would lead me to the base of the “Y.” The sound of us gulping for air is anxiety inducing even years later. Our heads were never below water, but it just doesn’t sound that way. It echoed in the most unnatural fashion. Yet, we couldn’t stop to question it.
We got to the surface and hurried out as loud as possible. We left the building and laid in the grass lot a couple hundred feet from the fence.
We didn’t say much that night. We didn’t have time. Soaking and bloodied, we caught our breath and left our own ways. It wasn’t for a couple days that we met back up and went over what happened.
We came back to that building many times after that but never went back to the cafeteria.
We would joke about what happened and treat it lightly but once we stepped foot in that basement, we never even looked that way.
Each of us has our own version of the story. We all experienced something different that night. The limited lighting, drugs, and active imaginations makes it really hard sharing the story among close friends. Since then, details have been muddied and we even doubt something happened.
I know what I felt and what I didn’t see but there are two key elements that we all emphasize when recalling the events that night: The sheer overwhelming hunger and eagerness of the void to consume us and the odd feeling that the cadence of our breathing was unnaturally off.