The stench of human waste and unwashed body overwhelmed the deeply unpleasant smells of the abandoned subway line, hitting me like a wall. How the hell did my mom put up with this. I held a hand up under my nose stop stifle the smell but it didn’t help. Tired, I asked, “Armin, how much further?”
The large man a few feet ahead of me and half turned, “Just through there miss.” Then he pointed at an archway in the brick with an A3 stenciled over it, long since faded and hard to see in the gloom.
He led me through to a narrow tunnel where people were laying in various stages of consciousness. I stepped carefully past them, trying not to look like I didn’t want to brush against them while desperately not wanting to brush against them.
“Kevin’s waiting in there for you. It was nice meeting you.” He paused, heavy eyebrows furrowed over his filth shadowed face. “She was very kind, your mom. I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
I gave him something of a smile and thanked him before moving past to the door at the end of the hall and opened it.
The rusted door shrieked in protest as I opened it. The room was oddly well lit with tube lights overhead, flickering in a hypnotic pattern. The floor was covered in yellow short carpet, the walls had faded and stained wallpaper of a similar color to the carpet. Against the opposite wall was another door with a lit exit sign over it.
Sitting on the floor was a slim, filthy man with wild hair who looked like he was in the middle of prayer. I was about to back away when he looked up at me, wild green eyes staring.
“Come to call the room have you?” He grinned as he snapped to his feet with more grace than he had any right to move with. The action also caused his considerable body odor to waft over to me, making my eyes water.
“Ahh, no. I’m here to see Kevin. Is that you?” I asked, trying to keep the worry from my voice.
The man moved closer and held up a blue ballpoint pen. “You see this? It’s real debris from the room. I’ll sell it to you. Only $20!!”
Before I could reply, the exit door opened and another person came through. He(??) wore a heavy cloth robe that was matted with all kinds of unidentifiable filth. The man offering me the pen turned his head to see the new arrival.
“Sorry sorry sorry!!” The wild eyed man said suddenly. “Sorry miss! I go! May the room see you safely through,” and then he scurried out the way I entered.
Bewildered, I looked to the new arrival. “Kevin?”
“Yes,” the man replied. “You must be Beth, Amanda’s daughter. Am I right?” Kevin approached but didn’t get too close, instead he sat on the carpet and motioned for me to do the same.
Not wanting to be rude, I saw carefully on the worn carpet while doing my best to stay up wind of him. “That’s right. Thanks for seeing me.” Then I remembered the note in my moms diary and quickly fished a hundred dollar bill out of my purse, laying it on the ground between us.
Kevin deftly snatched the money and put it in a vest pocket. Now that was closer to him, I saw that his sunken blue eyes were alert and intelligent. The thick beard on his face seemed to otherwise take over like a weed.
“Welcome to the Seekers of the Rooms.” He gestured to the decor around them. “Do you like our entry? We’ve done all we could to make it feel authentic. Our members come here to commune with it and call to it, hoping to be permitted entry to its glory.”
I nodded, a sense of discomfort filled me. My mom’s diary said this was safe but it felt insane - why visit a cult worshipping some internet urban legend?
“It’s very… interesting. My mother’s notes said she came to visit with you but the pages about what she discussed were missing. I’m trying to find her.”
Kevin moved his lips in a way that made his beard shift around like an unhappy animal. “Very smart lady, she was. Very smart.” He paused for a moment and I waited, not wanting to be rude. “She wanted to call the rooms, you know. Wanted to understand it all.”
Then he laughed at this, a whispery rattling sound. It was awful. “No one can understand it all. She had ideas though and we felt it was a holy mission.” There was another pause as he began licking his fingers. It took everything in me to hide my revulsion at this.
“But we didn’t have what she wanted. We shared ideas though. It was good.”
I nodded, “That’s good. Ahh Kevin, what was she wanting to do? What is calling the rooms?”
Kevin shook his head several times before replying, “Most people find the back rooms on accident. On backcident!” He said with a giggle at his own joke. “Just slip through the cracks and there you are. Or so they think. Really it chooses them to see if they are worthy but none are. Most die. Some escape.”
“Have you been there?” I asked.
“My wife.” He replied softly. “She opened a door at the hospital. She was pregnant.” Kevin’s voice became a soft sob. “I saw the room beyond the door. She was looking at me as she walked into what she thought was the women’s bathroom. Door closed behind her. She never came out.”
He gestured around the room. “I’ve begged the Rooms to accept me, to reunite us but they ignore my unworthy pleas.” Kevin stood slowly from his spot and motioned me to follow him through the door marked exit.
Not knowing what else to do, I followed him into another tunnel, filthy like the others but clearly where people sleep.
“I don’t have answers for you child.” He shuffled to an alcove and began to rummage through a pile of filth. Eventually he fished out a tattered sheet of paper covered in lines and he handed it to me.
Using my phone as a flashlight, I looked closer. It was a subway tunnel map with markings all over it. I held it up to him and said, “What is this?”
He shook his head again several times before he answered. “She had an idea that the Backrooms might have an affinity to forgotten spaces. I let her make a copy of my map.”
I squinted at it, struggling to make sense of it. “Why? Why did she want it?”
“She said I’d been touched by the room and this gave me special insight.” He smiled shyly at this, eyes cast down at the memory.
“I don’t understand. If you’d found the room, wouldn’t you be in there?”
“I hadn’t found the room again. But I found where it once was. There’s residue there, of sort. She wanted to see it.” He looked up at me. “She went alone but if you want, I can take you and show you what I mean.”