The Gravity Myth

Hole

Evan woke with a bad taste in his mouth and an even worse smell in his nostrils. He smacked his tongue against the roof of his mouth and fluttered his eyes, attempting to shake off a hangover headache. Gingerly, he brought a hand up to rub his temple. As it passed by his nose, waves of nausea sucker-punched his stomach, and the reflex to vomit was too hard to ignore.

Evan puked up yesterday's ramen and whatever was left of a twenty-four pack of shitty light beer. When that ran out, the dry heaves brought gouts of sickly tart bile. Again, Evan reached his hand toward his face, intending to wipe the mess away. The stench hit him afresh, quickly followed by another swell of nausea. His head wrenched back instinctively.

BANG.

It connected sharply with the hard surface he was seated against. Punch-drunk and drunk-drunk, Evan moaned aloud.

"Hello?", a woman's voice called out.

Evan groaned again, "Shut up Miss Broadchurch." The old neighbor lady was always harassing him whenever his stereo got a little too loud, yelling at him or banging her broom against the cheap stucco walls.

"What? I can't hear you", the voice called back.

"My music's not even on!" He muttered, "You goofy bitch." Even with eyes fully open now, it was still dark. Had he slept through the entire day? Whatever, he didn't have work today. The hands that had offended his every sense were covered in a sticky, foul-smelling slime. Jesus, he really hoped he hadn't shit himself. The fetid sludge soaked his pants. When he placed his palms on the ground to raise himself up, they dipped into a thick layer of it. God, it reeked horribly. Usually he would be used to even the worst of smells by now, but it permeated his wavering consciousness.

"Where are you?", the voice cried.

"Gimme a minute", Evan replied, hauling himself to a standing position. More like a hunched position, really. He walked with one arm Frankensteined outward, the other above his head, searching for the pull-chain to the ceiling light. The raised hand came up empty, but his outstretched fingers touched the cool face of a stone wall. Stone. Not drywall, like his crappy apartment should have been, but unyielding stone. "The fuck...?", Evan whispered.

"Heyheyhey," the girl from nowhere desperately sputtered. "What's your name? I'm Callie. I'm a singer. I have people looking for me right now. If you can get out and help me escape, my managers and family can pay you!" Her words blended together in a giant run-on sentence. "I'm famous. We can pay a lot of money."

"Where are you?" Evan drawled, "What's going on? This isn't my home."

"No shit, Sherlock", the voice huffed back. "You're stuck here, just like me."

Evan chewed on those words for a bit. It took his mind off the foul odor for a few seconds. His hands brushed the wall in front of him, absent-mindedly searching for a door, a window, a light switch, anything. He still couldn't see shit, and everything was so much harder to figure out stumbling around blindly. The residual hangover and possible concussion didn't help any. "How did I.... we.... get here?" he asked.

"I don't know", the girl named Callie answered. "The last thing I remember was being at a house... party. I think I had too much to drink. Or maybe some asshole roofied me. I don't know." She repeated. "Then I woke up in here. I don't even know how long I've been here. I'm so hungry." Her voice petered out near the end, and Evan could hear soft sobbing echoing all around him. The pain in her voice was quite real, and Evan's brow furrowed. It was the first time he'd felt pangs of empathy for anyone in quite some time.

"Look, I'm sorry this happened to you. I think it happened to me too. I was out drinking at some dive bar last night, and now I'm here. Can you see anything where you are? I don't think my room has any windows or lights or anything."