Chapter 4 The Basement Diary

# Chapter 4: The Basement Diary

Phase two began at dawn. I was awakened by Margaret gently shaking my shoulder, her face tight with worry.

"Mr. Blackwood requests your presence in the library immediately," she whispered, helping me into a robe—Vanessa's robe, silk and cream-colored. "He says to come as you are."

The calibrator was already on my temple, monitoring even my just-awoken expression. I kept my face carefully neutral despite the hammering of my heart.

"Did he say why?" I asked, slipping my feet into the waiting slippers.

Margaret shook her head, avoiding my eyes. "He seemed... agitated."

The library was on the main floor, a two-story room lined with leather-bound volumes that, I suspected, Russell had never read. When I entered, he was standing by the fireplace, a tumbler of amber liquid in his hand despite the early hour.

"Six minutes and twenty-three seconds," he said without looking at me. "Vanessa would have been here in five."

"I'm sorry," I replied automatically. "Margaret had to help me with—"

"Silence." Russell finally turned, his eyes bloodshot. Had he slept at all? "Do you know what today is?"

I searched my memory for significant dates. It wasn't their anniversary, nor Vanessa's birthday.

"Tuesday, September 14th," I ventured.

"It's been exactly seven months since Vanessa's death." He drained his glass. "Seven months since I found her floating in the pool, her lungs filled with water instead of air."

My skin prickled. This was the first time Russell had directly mentioned how Vanessa died.

"I'm sorry for your loss," I said softly, using Vanessa's compassionate tone.

"Are you?" He set down his glass with deliberate control. "I wonder. Last night, after our... incident... I reviewed the security footage from your suite. You've been keeping items that don't belong to you."

My blood froze. Had he found the autopsy report? The blood-stained blouse?

"The plain bandages," he continued, his voice dangerously calm. "Someone has been bringing you unauthorized items. Someone has been helping you maintain your own identity instead of becoming Vanessa."

Relief flooded me, quickly replaced by new fear. The mysterious notes, the bandages—someone was indeed helping me, and now they might be in danger.

"I found them in the guest bathroom," I lied. "I didn't know they weren't permitted."

Russell's eyes narrowed. "Don't lie to me, Cecilia. It doesn't suit Vanessa's face."

He crossed to a desk and pressed a button. A panel in the wall slid open, revealing a security monitor displaying footage from the previous day. There was Margaret, entering my room while I was in the garden, placing something on my dressing table.

"Margaret has been terminated," Russell said flatly. "Her replacement arrives tomorrow. But first, we need to address your failure to fully commit to your transformation."

He pressed another button, and the library's double doors opened. Lawrence entered, pushing a wheelchair.

"What's this?" I asked, unable to keep the tremor from my voice.

"Phase two," Russell replied. "Complete immersion therapy."

Before I could react, Lawrence was behind me. I felt a sharp prick in my neck, and immediately my limbs began to feel heavy. Not enough to render me unconscious, but sufficient to make resistance futile as Lawrence guided me into the wheelchair.

"You'll thank me for this, Cecilia," Russell said as Lawrence secured straps around my wrists and ankles. "You've been holding back, maintaining a barrier between yourself and Vanessa. Today, we break that barrier."

Lawrence wheeled me out of the library and down a corridor I hadn't explored before. Russell walked alongside, speaking as if delivering a lecture.

"The mansion was built in 1887 by my great-great-grandfather," he explained. "Like many homes of that era, it has certain... features that modern sensibilities might find disturbing."

We stopped before a heavy oak door reinforced with iron bands. Russell produced an old-fashioned key from his pocket.

"Few people know about this level of the house," he continued, unlocking the door to reveal a narrow stone staircase descending into darkness. "Vanessa discovered it by accident during our first year of marriage. She was... disturbed by what she found."

Lawrence carefully maneuvered the wheelchair down the steps, the descent jolting despite his efforts. The air grew colder, damper, as we descended. The walls changed from plastered elegance to rough-hewn stone.

"The original owner kept his insane wife down here," Russell remarked casually. "Not my ancestor, of course—he purchased the property later. But the facilities remain... serviceable."

At the bottom of the stairs, Russell flipped a switch, illuminating a long corridor lined with doors. Some were modern steel with electronic locks; others were ancient wood with barred windows. It was like a private prison.

"What is this place?" I managed to ask through dry lips, the drug making my speech slightly slurred.

"My workshop was just a preview, Cecilia," Russell replied. "This is where the real work happens."

Lawrence wheeled me to one of the modern doors. Russell pressed his palm against a scanner, and the door slid open with a pneumatic hiss.

Inside was a room that looked like a cross between a medical facility and a recording studio. A hospital bed stood in the center, surrounded by screens and audio equipment.

"Vanessa spent three days here during our first year together," Russell said as Lawrence transferred me from the wheelchair to the bed. "She emerged... improved."

"You kept my sister prisoner down here?" I fought against the restraints now being attached to the bed, but the drug made my movements weak and uncoordinated.

"Not prisoner. Patient." Russell moved to a control panel. "Vanessa had certain... independent tendencies that needed correction. Just as you do."

He turned to Lawrence. "Leave us."

Once we were alone, Russell sat on a stool beside the bed, studying my face with clinical interest.

"The drug will wear off in approximately thirty minutes," he informed me. "Enough time for me to explain the process. For the next seventy-two hours, you will be immersed in Vanessa's life—her thoughts, her feelings, her experiences. The screens will display footage of her daily routines. The audio system will play her voice reading her private journals. You will eat what she ate, sleep when she slept, even use the bathroom on her schedule."

He gestured to a catheter setup nearby, and I felt bile rise in my throat.

"This is insane," I whispered.

"This is dedication," he corrected. "But I'm not unreasonable. I've prepared something to help you through this transition."

Russell reached beneath the bed and pulled out a cardboard box. From it, he removed a leather-bound book with a familiar floral pattern on the cover. My heart stopped.

Vanessa's diary.

"Where did you get that?" I demanded, momentarily forgetting my role.

"It was among her personal effects," Russell replied, turning the book over in his hands. "I never read it while she was alive—I respected her privacy. But after she died..." He trailed off, his expression darkening. "I learned many surprising things about my wife. And about you."

He opened the diary to a marked page and began to read aloud:

"'April 10th. Ceci called today, excited about her new photography assignment in Berlin. I envy her freedom sometimes. Her ability to just pick up and go wherever her camera takes her. Russell would never allow such spontaneity. Sometimes I wonder if I made the right choice, staying here while she explores the world.'"

Russell turned to another marked page.

"'June 15th. Switched places with Ceci at Mother's birthday dinner. Russell never noticed. It's amazing how even after three years of marriage, he can't tell the difference when we decide to play our old game. Ceci says it's because he only sees the surface—the perfect wife, the perfect hostess. Sometimes I wonder if anyone sees the real me anymore.'"

My mouth went dry. The twin-swapping game—a childhood habit we'd continued occasionally into adulthood, always for brief, harmless occasions. I'd almost forgotten.

"You and Vanessa switched places," Russell said, his voice tight with controlled anger. "You tricked me. How many times?"

"It was just a game," I said weakly. "Just once or twice, for a few hours at family events. Nothing serious."

"Nothing serious?" Russell slammed the diary shut. "My wife allowed another woman to impersonate her in my presence, and you call that 'nothing serious'?"

"Russell, please—"

"I've indulged your questions long enough," he cut me off, standing abruptly. "The immersion begins now. By the time you leave this room, there will be no more Cecilia. Only Vanessa."

He placed the diary on a small table within my reach. "Read it. Learn from it. Become her."

With that, he walked to the door. Before exiting, he paused. "Oh, and the calibrator will continue monitoring you. Any emotional responses that deviate from Vanessa's patterns will result in... corrective measures."

The door closed behind him with a final-sounding click.

Alone in the basement room, I tested my restraints. They allowed limited movement—enough to reach the diary and use the touchscreen controls for the bed and basic functions, but not enough to escape. The drug was already wearing off, my mind clearing.

The screens around me flickered to life, each showing different footage of Vanessa—cooking in the kitchen, reading in the garden, sleeping peacefully. Her voice came through the speakers, reading entries from what must have been another copy of her diary.

"September 3rd. Russell surprised me with tickets to the ballet tonight. Sometimes his thoughtfulness takes my breath away..."

I tuned out her voice and focused on the diary Russell had left. If I was going to be trapped here for three days, I might as well use the time productively.

I opened the diary, skimming through entries from the early years of Vanessa's marriage. At first, they were filled with love and optimism. But gradually, a darker tone emerged.

"November 20th. Found another camera today, this one in my bathroom. When I confronted Russell, he claimed it was for my protection. Said he worries about me falling or fainting when I'm alone. I pretended to believe him."

"February 7th. Russell's 'protection' is becoming suffocating. He questions every call, monitors my location through my phone, chooses my clothes each morning. Mother thinks I'm living a fairy tale. If only she knew."

I continued reading, my heart breaking for my sister. The controlling behavior I'd experienced from Russell was apparently nothing compared to what Vanessa had endured. And yet, there were no entries suggesting she planned to leave him. Why had she stayed?

As I turned to the final section of the diary, I found entries from just weeks before her death.

"March 2nd. Russell's behavior is becoming more erratic. Yesterday he threw away an entire meal I'd prepared because I used the wrong serving dish. Later, he apologized with diamonds. Always the same pattern—cruelty followed by extravagant gifts. I'm so tired."

Then, the entry that made my blood run cold:

"March 15th. If Russell discovers I'm the sister... I'll have to activate Plan B. I've left instructions with Dr. Westfield. Ceci, if you're reading this—and somehow I know you will be—remember our promise under the willow tree. Everything you need is where the light meets the water."

The entry ended there. I frantically flipped to the next page, but it had been torn out. All that remained were faint indentations in the paper beneath—the pressure marks from Vanessa's pen on the missing page.

I held the book at an angle, trying to catch the light in a way that would make the indentations readable. Slowly, I made out a few words: "He has always loved..."

The rest was too faint to decipher.

My mind raced. "If Russell discovers I'm the sister"? What did that mean? Had Vanessa been impersonating me at some point? And who was Dr. Westfield? The name wasn't in any of the files I'd seen.

The willow tree reference was clear—it referred to a massive willow on our childhood property where we'd made our most solemn promises. And "where light meets water" could only be the pool house, where the afternoon sun reflected off the swimming pool, creating dancing patterns on the ceiling.

I needed to get out of this basement and search the pool house. But first, I had to survive the next seventy-two hours without losing myself in Russell's "immersion therapy."

I settled back against the pillows, forcing my breathing to match the rhythm of Vanessa's in the videos playing around me. The calibrator on my temple blinked green—approving my performance.

As Vanessa's voice continued reading diary entries through the speakers, I closed my eyes and began planning my escape from the basement—and, ultimately, from Russell's twisted world.

But the diary's revelations haunted me. If Vanessa had been planning something—"Plan B"—before her death, what exactly had she set in motion? And more disturbing still: had Russell killed her because he'd discovered some deception, some twin-swap gone wrong?

The questions swirled in my mind as Vanessa's voice surrounded me, speaking words that no longer sounded like my sister at all, but like a carefully constructed character—one that Russell had molded through his "immersion therapy" and constant surveillance.

I was beginning to understand that the Vanessa I was contracted to become might never have truly existed at all.