Underneath all that cement, you would not notice the corpse. Not from a distance and not within the light-less room. A dessicated thing sleeping mummified and quiet and still in that peaceful shack among the mountains. A tomb waiting for one more, once more, to step into history.

He stood at the bend of the the Little Cub mountain pass, his finger pointed out towards the edge of the San Joaquin mountain line where the rocky walls bent and turned, where the sun was just beginning to rise from. Morning, the light was only starting to creep upon the mountain ridge. They were coming up to the child’s secret. He looked empty as he stared at the long path. Slowly, he rocked in his bike seat. The wheel dug into the ground, the grovel and stone digging deep.

Jose shook Michael once.

“Are you falling asleep?”

Michael shook his head and blinked.

Cold air had left his young wide eyes dry. He felt cold that morning, even after miles and miles of cycling. Michael raised his pointer finger towards a spot along the mountain, somewhere further beyond the bend.

“It’s over there,” He said. “But you can’t tell nobody. Okay?”

“Yeah, alright. What’s to tell, though? You’re a liar,”

“I’m not lying,”

“Yeah, okay,” Jose said.

“I’m telling you how it is,” Michael swallowed his throat. “I found it in a little house out there,”

“Whatever,” Jose spat on the floor. Both young - Jose, a year younger. And like all youths. They bickered, rough played, and loved hazard. They did not wear safety gear and they drove fast into the winding path. The branches and twigs off Joshua trees scratched at them. They narrowed themselves and ducked towards their bike handles. A barbed, spiny path into the mountain ridge. It was as if the world were trying to get them away.

They did not care for warnings.

Jose rode close behind Michael. His eyes were set on the horizon. The path grew smaller, the walking trail soon disappeared into grassy obscurity. They off roaded onto little slivers of worn dirt where the grass was high and tawny and where it raked against their ankles. They ran over snakes and leaned their heads low until they were well beneath their handles. Past a little stream, down the slope. They stopped at the train tracks. Michael braked. The wheel screeched as he angled it. Dirt and dust rose from his landing spot. He looked out towards the tracks, further into the distance, fogged and blurry, a train body laid on its side, the lid-hole stuck open, the body tagged bright pink and green. Michael rode towards it. Jose followed. Jose turned towards the wreckage. Needles, glass pipes on the floor, still smoking and steaming. The smell horrible, unique, like sweet urine. Staring into the dark. A pair of eyes looked back at him. The figure moving in the dark of his container. Jose peddles faster.

“Are we close” Jose asked.

“Nope,”

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They rode. And rode. And rode. Fog disappeared. The sun rose high. Sweat was on them, drenching them. Streaks ran down their faces and into their clothes. They were covered in the sheen for the better of the two hour ride. And in those final slow cycles of fatigue, they saw the building at the distance. They rode tired and desperate. When they got close to the house, the dropped their bike along the the grass and breathed. Jose clutched at the ground as he took desperate breaths and surveyed the area. Empty spots in the dirt around, where other community houses used to be, where sun burnt broken planks now were. The remnants of a water tower among the broken town. Half of the metal scaffold still remaining. The rest collapsed and overgrown. All of it rusted. And finally - the house.

The house Michael had not taken his eyes off since they had arrived. Jose breathed heavy on his knees. He looked at Michael, then into the darkness of the ruined house. A quiet in the mountain that drained him of any courage. He breathed heavy. He looked at the door frame. Into that deeper dark within. His legs did not want to stand.

Michael walked towards the house.

“Wait. Wait for me,” Jose wiped his hands against his pants and chased after him.

The building seemed more cabin. Michael went up the steps of the porch. Jose chased, setting one foot on the first step. The board cracked. His leg fell through and he yelped.

Michael pulled him out. They checked for nails in his shoe. Just scratches and rips in his pant leg. They walked up, slower now. They tested the floor with their toes. They walked with patience. The inside smelled of death. Cobwebs at every intersection, like a catacomb. No paintings, just tagging. Beer bottles. More needles. Cast iron skillets with something yellow pooled to one side. Bugs dead and shriveled.

“Where is it?” Jose asked.

“You sure you wanna see it?”

“Isn’t that why you brought me here?”

“I guess,”

“You guess? You wanna show me or not?”

Michael fidgeted. He bit his lip. Then he pointed down the hall - the only hall. A narrow passage way lit barely by the few interstices of daylight, the ceiling above peppered with holes into a patchwork. He navigated within the light. His footsteps shaking someone in the brittle walls. Centipedes ran away from his vibrations, past his foot. He almost screamed. He came up the first room. Bedroom. The bed frame flat on the ground, a mattress against the window. Some glass on the floor. Condoms. Blood.

A breeze hit the side of the walls. It sounded like a whistle as it went through the holes of the house.

He walked further down. Opposite side of the hall now. Each step, the rank smell of something old and sweet. Rotten fruit? Jose approached the door. It was hanging off one hinge. He pushed it with his shoulder, throwing all of his ninety pounds of his twelve year old body into it. The door snapped off the rusted hinge. It fell against the wall and slammed into the floor. Dust rose. Jose coughed. He cleared the air with his hand and looked into the bathroom. There was no light within. He could barely see anything. Immediately to him, A faucet ripped out its socket. Half a mirror. And then something else, something within a section of dark at the end of the bathroom. He stood at the entrance looking inside the dark, his eyes slow in adjustment. Then he turned. Jose looked back to Michael waiting in the middle of the hall way. Both of their faces featureless and shadowed.

“You aren’t telling anyone, right?” Michael kept twitching. “I didn’t do anything, okay? Okay?”

Jose said nothing. He did not even breath. He just walked and the tub appeared in view. Something bulged from within. Two arms, tied and entangled, hanging along the lip, broken off the shoulder socket. Jose took hold of the curtains and pushed them to the side. He poked his head inside. Urine spilled down his torn leg.

Then he screamed.

TEENAGE BIKERS DISCOVER HORROR HOUSE - JOCELYN FLORES FOUND DEAD AFTER EIGHT YEARS MISSING.