The corridor is long and turns a corner. I close my eyes. You can do this. Without looking back, because I can’t stand to see the guilt in Hazel’s eyes right now, I step forward and allow the door to close behind me.

This is it. I’m in here now.

I place my palm on the wall to steady my wobbly legs and shuffle down the narrow walkway. Caleb has gone uncharacteristically quiet. Though what more does he need to say? He told Hazel to go because he knew I would volunteer in her place. Everything that he wanted to happen is now in motion.

Swallowing a lump the size of a bowling ball, I turn the corner. There’s a door, obviously, up ahead.

You’re fine, you’re fine, you’re fine.

My hand grazes the smooth wall as I take the last few steps.

Caleb hasn’t told me to go through the door but waiting here seems pointless. I turn the handle, still using my other hand to keep me vertical.

I am breathing fast as I step into the clothes room. The hooks that Hazel and I took our bags from have been refilled. Two new bags embroidered with an S sit in their place.

They’ve been in here after us, setting up for the next person.

Sick, sick, sick.

“You guys need help,” I mutter.

I walk to the middle of the small room and drop my hands to my sides.

It’s only when I’m waiting for instruction that my heart starts to beat wildly. I’m alone. I’m going into one of those rooms. What have I done?

I gasp, desperate to fill my deflating lungs. I want out. I want to go home. And I want my mom.

“Open the door to the corridor, Piper,” Caleb instructs.

Nope. Don’t want to. My earlier confidence has abandoned me, and for the first time since they locked us in here, I feel as scared as I should.

“Open the door, Piper.”

My arm lifts, almost independently, my body following orders. This is what I need to do. I have to turn off, go somewhere else, so whatever is about to happen only affects my body.

I walk through the door, and I’m back almost at the start. The corridor of doors. The start of the labyrinth of horrors.

Which room?

“Room two is open, Piper.”

Room two. Which one is that again? Temperature. I think it’s exposure. That I can do. My town is on flat land; we get no shelter from the bitterly cold wind in the winter or the blistering sun in the summer.

I don’t know which one is room two, but logic would suggest one of the doors closest to the entrance. There are three on either side.