Chapter 6

The door slams and the light turns red on the alarm pad. Once again, we are left with her. Apparently she had been a good girl yesterday and had been allowed to go upstairs with him last night. I don’t want to think about what that meant but it did give me and Trace a chance to finally talk all this out, in the dark. We talked all night, trying to think of plans upon plans on how to get ourselves out of this mess. Every plan we pitched Trace shot down and found a fault in. He’s really given up. He’s praying for a miracle and I’m looking for an escape.

We decided that whatever we did Sarah was key. We need to somehow get her on our side or to at least figure out what’s wrong with her so it doesn’t happen to us. It’s been hard, though. We’ve been here for about three or four days, it’s hard to really know what time it is or how fast time is moving when you’re in a basement and can’t even see the sun and how it looks in the sky at different times in the day. They took our watches when we were kidnapped, too. We’ve been down here with no sense of time and doing nothing but trying to sleep and watching her color or watch cartoons.

Now that we aren’t bounded to the wall or floor we have more flexibility in our movement. But we haven’t tried anything. Trace started crying pretty hard yesterday. He curled up in a ball on the floor and just let it out. I tried to get him to talk but he just said he was taking a nap. He ended up falling asleep and I ended up watching Cinderella, then Snow White and then Sleeping Beauty.

She really is like a child when she watches these movies. She sits Indian style on the floor or on her stomach on her bed with her feet up in the air. She doesn’t move her gaze from the television and only speaks when she wants to sing along with the songs. Sometimes she has snacks or a drink. I thought about trying to ask her for some of it the other day. Three days or however long it’s been of bologna, bread and water is disgusting. I haven’t asked her for any of her treats yet. I spend most of my time just watching her because any attempt I’ve made at trying to get to know her, to get to know her past and who she is, it just fails and she says she wants to watch cartoons. Plus, I think she told the uncle guy about me asking questions because when he came down here this morning, escorting her down from his disgusted and perverted bed, he not only brought us a surprise breakfast of off-brand poptarts (uncooked of course) but he got down in my face and said in a low voice, “stop questioning her!” and then instructed her to get a bath and that he’d be back to check on us at lunch time.

The asshole doesn’t really scare me anymore. I mean, yeah, he’s got a gun. But when I threw up all over his carpet and desk he didn’t freak out. He got annoyed with me and Bernie asked if I should be punished, but he just rolled his eyes and said he was thinking about getting new carpet anyway and they cleaned me up, gave me some water and bread and sent me on my way. It was so good, too. It was just like plain white Wonder bread, but it was so damn good.

That’s when I lost my fear of that bastard. The carpet thing would work for us. Get some carpet guys in the house, me and Trace could scream like hell, and then, maybe get out, or at least let someone find us.

I made that decision last night when me and Trace were talking. If the worst does happen I don’t want to be lost for forever. I want momma and dad and daddy and Lisa and the boys to all have some closure. I don’t want them to be searching for us forever.

It’s weird. I’ve never really thought about my own mortality until now. I use to be afraid to think of it. One time, like back when Britney and I started having problems, she was in New York and it was September 11th. I remember watching the news and not being able to get through to her on her phone. I got so freaked out and started thinking about what if something ever really happened to one of us and we died. I got obsessed about it for a few days and just cried. But now, I’m thinking rationally. I guess you are just forced into that mode when you are put in these situations. I don’t know.

My fear about how hard it would be get out of the house if we got the door opened was confirmed when they brought me back down stairs without a shroud. They just led me to the basement stairs. You go through the house and then down this long corridor where there’s only one other room. You enter that room and there’s nothing in there except a chair by a door and a guard sitting in that chair, a big guard with an even bigger rifle.

Down that door is Sarah’s room.

He hasn’t told me if he called Cameron back or if he’s gotten any money. I assume not because then we’d probably be dead. I’d ask, but I don’t want to get smacked. I learned that shutting up and just sitting here when he’s around is the best thing. He likes it when we act fearful. He smiles at Trace ‘cause Trace cowers in his presence. He feeds off fear and gets high off it like it’s a drug.

So when he comes down, I just stare at the floor. I thought about staring at Sarah with a weird look to creep him out, but I figured that would just fuck me over some more. I’m not giving in here though, dammit. If the asshole wants to play mind games I’m gonna fuckin’ try my best to play with him.

Trace is snoring. I hope he’s dead asleep dreaming of Jack Daniels and Elisha and being back home in Tennessee. We didn’t sleep at all last night. Really. We stayed up talking the entire night. Like as soon as Sarah was taken up stairs and the light was turned off we sat on our asses in the pitch black and talked all night. We talked for hours and finally, when Trace started talking about how much he wanted to go to sleep and I said we should probably get some rest, Uncle busted down the door with Sarah in tow. He tossed us our poptarts and that was that.

Trace will probably sleep for a good few hours but I just can’t. I’ve barely slept since we’ve been down here. I can’t. I can’t sleep until my body just gives out or until we get out of here. This whole time I’ve been scheming, planning. I’ve been wondering if I can get up and get to the fridge, wondering if Sarah would scream for Uncle. We don’t really know what she would do if we tried to move around the room cause we haven’t tried.

We can stand up though. When they come down to check on us and give us food we both get to go pee or shit in the bathroom and they don’t help us up. They just stand there and watch us. It’s kind of weird but I figure this situation isn’t really normal. It could be worse as I told trace. We could not even have a toilet and have to shit in the corner or something. In the bathroom there are cabinets but they are all locked up. She doesn’t have a shower, just a bath and there is a beige towel that is balled in the corner by the tub. She has that Winne-the-Pooh shampoo with the characters on the top of them.

She’d in there right now. I can hear her splashing around and humming to herself. The guy pulled out some clothes for her and put them in the bathroom and I heard him give her strict orders to put on her clothes before she left the bathroom. The door war cracked when they were in there and I think he helped her undress. I heard doors open and shut and heard him say, “be a good girl and take your medicine.”

He’s such a fucking sicko.

I can hear the water start to drain from the tub and I wonder if Sarah would let us color or draw or something today. Maybe I could convince Trace to play hang man with me or tic tac toe. It’d be better than watching Alice in Wonderland or Lady and the Tramp or something. I think today I should try with her. Maybe try to get some snacks or something.

I hear a scream. For a second I think I’m gonna throw up that poptart but then it stops and I can actually her hyperventilating.

“Sarah?” I call out, hoping she’s ok and hoping I don’t have to get that bastard down here to help her. No, I can do this on my own. I don’t need him down here again torturing Trace and molesting her.

The bathroom door swings open. I almost scream as well. She looks like your normal twenty year old girl coming out of the shower with a towel wrapped around her, brushing against her thighs. Her chest is heaving and she has a bit of cleavage. Her hair is wet and hanging limply around her head, dripping onto her shoulders and the floor. He face looks pained and worried but I don’t know what’s wrong.

Then I see the blood. There’s not a lot, but enough to scare me and its spread against the inside of her thighs in a light coat. On a normal tanned girl I probably wouldn’t even notice it or just think of it as a birth mark. But against her white skin it’s like my eyes can’t help but go towards it. I can’t look away. She’s crazed, breathing hard and making little whimpering noises and she stares at me for a moment before going into the bathroom again, her back to me. I see she’s pulling her towel aside and looking down at herself. What did she do? Did she cut herself shaving or something? I noticed those pink razors in there, so I know she does it and I’ve noticed how her legs look like the normal legs of a girl my age, well a girl who’s never been outside.

“Sarah, are you ok? Did you hurt yourself?”

Trace sighs in his sleep and shifts a little bit. God, I hope he doesn’t wake up. The last thing I want for him to do is wake up and see her bleeding. He’ll freak.

She looks over her shoulder and just stares at me with the eyes that a kid gets when they scrape their knee or get stung by a bee, big glassy eyes with a frown. She sniffles. I’m gonna have to get up and console her. I do my best to push myself off the floor without falling. These damned cuffs are so limiting. They’re better than being chained to the wall, but still, their almost worse. You can move, but not a lot. It’s like they’re making fun of you.

I finally shuffle over to her in the bathroom and I see Trace still asleep. I close the door halfway. I don’t want him hearing her or something. “What happened Sarah?”

“I did bad,” She whispers.

“What’d you do?” I ask, standing behind her, hoping she’ll turn around.

“I don’t know but uncle says when this happens I did something bad to deserve it.” She turns a bit and looks at me with a pout. “I hate it.”

Slowly I start to realize what she just said. “It…it happens a lot?” She nods and looks down at herself again. I take a breath and slowly ask her, “Sarah, did you get your period?”

She turns completely to me and has a curious look in her face. “What’s period?” But before I can answer her, her eyes widen and she looks down at her body and says in a soft, panicked voice, squeezing her legs together, “Stop it….”

“Here…just…” I don’t know what to do. I don’t have sisters. I don’t know what to do when a girl has her period. I mean with my girlfriends I saw their tampons and pad thingies but I didn’t sit there and teach them about it or give motherly advice on how to deal with cramps. This is weird.

I can’t just have her bleeding all over. Especially, oh god, period blood. That’s so nasty. I don’t mean to be a dick, but it just is. I gotta forget about that for now. Just forget she’s bleeding from her vagina and help her. If I freak out, she’s gonna scream for uncle and I don’t want that to happen.

Maybe if I help her, she’ll form some trust in me.

“Sit down on the toilet, ok?” I touch her shoulder and push her towards the opened toilet seat. Her skin is warm and still a bit pink from the bathwater. It’s smooth and untouched, like baby’s skin. She really must have never been out in the sun for this kind of thing to take place. She plops down on the seat and I watch her spread her legs and look down into the bowl. Weird, I think she’s watching herself bleed.

She closes her legs and looks up at me. She looks just like Jonathan use to when he would scrape his knee playing basketball with me. She wants me to make everything go away. She, oh my god, she looks like I’m the only one that can make it better, like I’m her savior.

I thought that was who uncle was.

Hmmm, there’s more to this that I know about. Something about her and him and how she acts. I hope I can figure it out.

I take some toilet paper and wet it in the sink and then turn back to her to give it to her to clean herself up. As I look at her and hand her the damp glob of paper she just looks at it and then at me. She doesn’t know what to do. She’s completely clueless and I’m gonna have to be the one to clean her up.

I take a deep breath and squat down in front of her. She spreads her legs so openly that I turn to look away. She’s showing me…not just her bloody thighs but other parts of her. I don’t want to be that uncle perv. I mean, I’m not sexually attracted to this poor girl. That’d just be gross. But still, staring at her or see her like that, it’s just, it’s not right. She has no sense of privacy or respect for her body. She was never taught.

I concentrate on the blood starting to dry on her thighs and wipe the cool cloth over her white skin. The almost greyishly white paper starts to turn pink and then a light shade of red. I can’t think about what I’m wiping up and figure maybe I should get to the bottom of this. “So what did you do bad Sarah?”

“I…” She sniffs. “I don’t know. Uncle says I’m bad and that’s what causes me to do that.”

I try and smile at her. I don’t think she’s seen enough genuine smiles in her life. “But why does he say that?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugs and I realize I’m not gonna get much out of her. I sigh in defeat and realize I need to get out of this bathroom with her. It’s just too weird. But then she starts to ramble, “Cause, cause I guess I messed up his bed once.” Her eyes start to widen and sparkle and she says, “He’s got the biggest bed and he lets me jump on it and we have tickle fights and he shows me how much he loves me and…” I try to ignore what she just said and just nod at her. “And, and one day I started doing this.” She points her to vagina, but I don’t look. I keep looking at her face and her eyes start to plead with mine. “I didn’t mean to. I really didn’t. And he got mad, really mad.”

“What’d he do?” I asked. I bet the bastard beat her.

“He punished me.” She looks away almost like she knows whatever he did was wrong. Then she starts to shake her head, like she’s trying to convince herself otherwise. “But I was a bad girl. He says I deserved it.” It’s like she knows. Somewhere deep inside of her she knows that this situation is fucked up.

But she’s too brainwashed to see it.

I wonder…I wonder if I can get her out of it. Shit, if I can get her out of it? If she realizes that uncle is not good, is not nice and that I am…

This might just work.

I lick my lips and clear my throat a little, putting my hand on her knee. She hasn’t seen affection either I bet. Well, not real affection, un-perverted affection. “You didn’t deserve that Sarah.” She bites her lip and I ask her, “It happened again didn’t it?”

She gets that whine in her voice that little girls get and nods, “Mmhmm, a little later it happened again and he gave me this stuff to put on it. But I didn’t know how and he got madder.”

“What’d he give you?” I ask.

“This thing in a little round thing. It looked like a white popsicle.”

I want to laugh, but I don’t. “A tampon?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugs and then reaches beside her on the floor between the toilet and the wall. She pulls up a plastic green pouch. Maxi-pads. “He also gave me these. But they just stick to everything. They stick to me down there and they hurt.”

“There...all cleaned up.” I throw the toilet paper in between her thighs into the toilet bowl. There’s like weird swirls of blood. Oh my god, why I am looking? Ok, since that asshole apparently didn’t show her how to do anything, I’m going to have to. I have the strange sense that I’m her doctor or something. I’m trying too hard to be professional and not over step boundaries or scar her or do something to make me feel like I’m being a pervert. “Can I see that bag of pads?” She looks confused for a moment and then picks up the green pouch again. “Yes, that.” I take it from her and look around it. It’s opened and about half full. I wonder how she wears these things if they hurt. I think you just stick them down in your underwear but I’m not sure. I find the directions and the little picture thing on the side that shows me how to do it and ask her, “Did you read the directions, Sarah?”

“I don’t know how.”

I just look at her. Wow. That explains some stuff, I guess.

“Oh….”

She clears her throat and looks at me a bit as I read over the directions. It’s weird. I’ve always taken for granted the fact that I know how to read. I mean, most people do but…shit… “Only boys know how to read.”

I cut my eyes to her and feel like going to punch that asshole, I don’t care the consequences. “Did uncle tell you that?”

“Yeah.”

I laugh a bit and pull her panties off the top of a folded pile that was on the floor in front of the sink. They have little pink crowns on them that say “Princess.” I pull out a little yellow envelope from the green pouch and ask, “Do you believe everything he says?”

“He’s my uncle.” She says in defense and I just ignore her and work to get this pad thing stuck to her panties. I don’t know if I have it in there right, but it’s sticking to her panties and won’t stick to her skin. I got one of the wing things under the middle of it to put it in place. I tried doing the other one, but, well, it got stuck to itself. These things are more complicated than I thought.

“Put these on.” I tell her and she looks at me for a moment and then reaches for them. She stands up and slides them up over her legs and up to her hips. “Does it feel ok?”

She nods and then a smile comes to her when she pulls them down again and looks at them. Then she starts to laugh. Well, I made her happy. One point for Justin.

“Yay! You fixed it!” She’s so happy and she reaches down and hugs me. I feel really weird about it and just pat her back. This whole thing is getting a little too weird. I mean, I just sat here and cleaned up this girl’s period blood. I’m kidnapped and she’s a weird half woman half girl. I bet if I get out of this someone will want to make a movie about it. No, I can’t let that happen. This is all too sick and twisted to be used for entertainment. Maybe one day I’ll write a book about it and give all the money from it to like a charity for people that are kidnapped or something.

Sarah starts changing in front of me and I look away. She’s standing there topless. Shit, I just saw her breasts. Great now I’m a perv because I think they are pretty. God, what is my deal? “Justin…”

I look up at her as she pulls a shirt over her head. It’s just a grey plain t-shirt. I wish I could wear clean clothes. Shit, I wish I could get in this bath tub right here. Maybe…nah… Uncle guy would torture me if he saw I was clean. I don’t think I’ve ever gone this long without taking a bath or a shower. 4 days.

Gross.

“What is it Sarah?” I ask her. She smiles. I smile back and her’s grows. God, she is such a child.

“You’re nice.”

“Thank you. I’m your friend, ok? You can trust me.”

She nods and starts to work on pulling up her shorts. I figure I’ll try and get somewhere a little deeper with her. I mean, we’re friends now, I guess. “Do you know why you get your period Sarah?” She just looks at me confused. “Why you bleed like that?”

“’Cause I’m bad.” She says matter a factly.

“Not really, Sarah. All young women get that. It’s called your period. You get it once a month. It doesn’t mean you’re bad. It just means you can have babies.”

She starts to laugh and giggle and finally says, “No I can’t. I have to have a husband first. You have to get married then the husband and wife become a mommy and daddy.”

Shit. This is gonna be a lot harder than I thought. She had no real concept of sex, at least I don’t think so. She still has that 5 year old where do babies come from attitude about it. This conversation is pointless and she seems uninterested with me as she starts to brush her teeth with a toothbrush that looks years old. The bristles are going in every direction. She has that Colgate sparkly toothpaste with the bubble gum flavor that I use to love when I was a kid. Maybe, maybe she’s not 20. Maybe she really is a 5 year old but has a disease that makes her ages quickly.

Hell, I don’t know.

“Do you wanna watch Aladdin with me?” She opens the door and smiles. “It’s my favorite.”