by Iris Taylor
I looked down at myself. I wasn't sure why Hans had left my pants on - it was unlikely to be out of any sympathy or concern. I had spied scorpions scuttling past, varying sizes of eight-legged creatures, and reminded myself to be thankful for not being found instead by boars, or bears, or any other creature glad to feast on me. I was sure they would be happy to find me. I refused to think about the poison these creatures probably carried.
My thoughts drifted back to Hans' words earlier, thrown carelessly as he hummed to himself, working on tying me up. My thrashing and kicking had done nothing to stop him - a minor nuisance, his strength overcoming mine the way one would hold off a child's kicks. "Cole needs to learn his lesson. He forgot again, and a little reminder is what he needs."
"What reminder do you mean?" I had been hoping to get him to continue talking, to prolong the things he was doing - because I had a weird certainty that he wouldn't harm me beyond this. Why he had earned this portion of my trust, I wasn't sure. But I just knew he wouldn't harm me beyond tying me up - yet. At the very least, I knew he wanted Cole to find me. He was sure Cole would find me. And so, I placed my hope in Cole, too.
"Cole forgets, sometimes. Forgets that we are one, him and I. It shouldn't be otherwise." And that was that, no matter how I rephrased the question.
And he had grinned at me, a flash of white teeth, before sauntering off in a different direction from where we came, or at least from what I remembered. There were no landmarks that I could discern, the trees all appearing identical to each other. I could only hear insects from where I sat, any nocturnal animals staying away from me, and dawn was still many hours away. My eyes barely adjusted in the darkness, it was that void of light. I was glad I had no superstitions, didn't believe in ghosts, nor did I have an overactive imagination. I shivered again, hating the dampness that seeped into my undies, hating how I began to itch, hopeful it was only because of the wet, and not from the crawling creatures whose territory I had invaded.
I thought back to earlier today. How Hans had pretended to be Cole, and how easily I had fallen for it. When my mind should have been screaming in alarm the moment he had told me he needed to use Hans' car, should have noticed how early he was to pick me up when Cole was always running late. I had zero self-preservation skills, it seemed. Being a too-trusting creature had major disadvantages. Hans had even brought me some takeout food, saying he wanted me fed well, and I had easily taken the noodles from him and eaten that. My major weakness - food. It was a wonder Hans hadn't put drugged it or poisoned it, at least not that I could see. But that meal was over eight hours ago, and my stomach rumbled yet again, an edge of pain beginning to gnaw into me. My bladder was full, but I knew I should be grateful I didn't need to go to the washroom for that other reason.
My vision was beginning to dim, but I fought my weariness, unwilling to fall asleep lest I missed something. Danger - or a chance to escape, whatever shape it may take. If anything - I was hopeful. I had always been a hopeful person, and now was not the time for me to fail me.
***
Light was still eluding the spot I was tethered to, the dense canopy barely giving me a peek of the sky above, although parts of the wood had begun to rouse, the birdsong telling me that dawn was near. My throat was dry, my shouting earlier having gone unanswered, except by the rabbits that had taken one look at me and hurried away. Rabbits - reminding me of what Hans had told me when he came to check on me earlier.
"Cole didn't let me have a pet rabbit. He never said why, but I knew it was because of him our dad changed his mind about getting me one." He had frowned then, his eyes suddenly hard, focused on mine. "I know why, of course. I had let him see Furry. His kitten," Hans had informed me, as if we were talking over lunch, at home in the kitchen. My skin was beyond raw from my working on the ties - without making any headway. The exposed skin was smarting and I tried my best not to wince as Hans prattled on. "It hated me, the little furball. It could tell between us, you know." He glanced towards me, and I stilled, hoping he wouldn't look at me too closely. "Always tried to run away, as if it knew what I wanted to do to it, what I ended up doing to it." That too-bright smile again, making him look like a shark in the background of deep, deep green. "Cole saw it, I made sure he did. Saw the clean dissection I had made from its neck down to its tail." He had leaned towards me, as if about to divulge a secret, and whispered, "I'll make a great surgeon, one day. With all the practice I'm getting, I could do it. If I lose my interest in football, that's my second choice." He had looked up then, looking into the distance, and quickly left, headed for whatever he had seen or heard. And that's when I broke down, all optimism and hope crumbling, and ended up screaming my throat raw for hours, until I gave up believing someone would save me.
Chapter 26
Cole
The morning chill seeped into my bones, making my sweater seem inadequate. I struggled to contain the panic that had steadily built up every hour I failed to locate Ella. I wondered how she had fared, wherever she was. At least it hadn't rained overnight, that Ella hadn't experienced the sharp drop in temperature that Gray Lake often saw this time of the year. Assuming she was outdoors, and alive. She had to be alive. Hans wouldn't have gotten rid of her, not yet, not when I hadn't laid my eyes on her yet. He had made sure Furry was still alive when I found him, although barely. His tiny heart was still beating, visible under the sternum he had somehow split open without killing him. I hadn't been able to say a word when I found him behind the shed at our old house, couldn't run, couldn't describe what Hans had done to the kitten to anyone after that, even years later. Hans had enveloped me in a hug when he found me, had stroked my back and told me that it was okay, he was here now, and stayed with me the entire twenty minutes it took for its heart to stop beating. He then helped me dig a small grave near the fence at the far end of the compound and buried it for me, all the while checking on me over his shoulder and attempting to soothe me. It was an eye-opener for me, a cruel one at that, and I finally saw the monster I called my twin.
Marcus was rubbing Ella's mom's back as she sobbed into his shoulder, the police milling around in the living room, having made the place a headquarter of sorts. We had each been questioned several times about the past twenty-four hours: when we had last seen Ella, what she had been wearing, did we hear that Hans had left the center? It was meant to be a missing person case, although given that Ella had disappeared only about twenty hours ago, they had wanted us to give her time to make her appearance. Had wanted to quell our fears by saying she was nearly eighteen, she was allowed to be gone somewhere overnight without telling anyone. Maybe she was with friends? But none of her few friends had heard from her after school. She didn't own a car, and it couldn’t be a coincidence that she had disappeared at the same time Hans had left the center and vanished, just before midnight last night. They only sat up straight once I enlisted Monica's help. Monica had coldly told them everything that had happened the night of the party - and what Ella had done to help her get out of the situation. My father had gotten out some documents explaining what the doctors and therapists had found, during Hans’ treatment - making the police finally listen, and call for more help and start a proper search for Ella. My disclosure about what had happened to various pets over the years, what I told them about my twin and his twisted mind only served to make them panic further.
Some of the policemen had gone down to the lake house, scouring the area for Ella and Hans, but they came back empty-handed. They were now readying to comb the woods, a magnanimous task given the vastness - there were hundreds of acres surrounding the lake, a great part of it owned by us. We hadn't enlisted help from the community yet - my dad had wanted to keep it under wraps, until absolutely necessary. Which was when, exactly? My mouth frowned at the grim thought.
"Cole?"
I jolted, not realizing how deep in thought I was. Monica was wringing her hands, her forehead furrowed. She looked like she wanted to cry, something I had never seen her do, not in the years
that I had known her. "They're gonna find her, right?" I could see Ella's mom holding her phone to her ear, as she had been doing on and off for the past few hours after learning about Ella's disappearance. Too bad Ella had a dinosaur of a phone - it worked too well in Hans' favor, the fact that we were unable to track it. I didn't have the heart to tell her there was no signal in the woods, either, if that was where Hans had brought her. Or that Hans had probably taken her phone away from her, and was enjoying knowing no one could reach her.
I nodded, exhaustion washing over me. I hadn't slept a wink since the morning before, and felt close to collapsing right now. My eyes burned, as did my back, but I couldn't stop my mind from racing, couldn't waste time sleeping. "We'll find her." Because we had to. It was part of the game, it would make Hans happy, but we had to find her. Please, I prayed to whoever would listen. Let her be safe. I refused to let my mind imagine in what state we would find her. Please.
A thought hit me like a truck. How had I not seen it before? I saw my dad speak in a low voice to one of the policemen, his eyes occasionally darting worriedly towards Ella's mom. "...have to try again," he was saying. "We might have missed them the first time."
I strode over to them. "The boathouse," I chimed in quietly. "I went there, but now I realize why Ella wasn't there. There's another place Hans and I liked to go to as kids. I'll come with you to show you."
The officer looked at me warily before nodding. We left the house together with several other police cars, and I finally succumbed to my exhaustion and fell asleep on the way there.
The trek into the woods was different from what I remembered. The trees seemed bigger, denser, the canopy interlocking, the forest not just made up of conifers but other manner of foliage I didn't know the names of. I prayed my memory would serve me right at this crucial time. After twenty minutes of heading eastward, I spotted a large moss-covered boulder that served as our hideout-cum-fortress when we were kids. "That way," I nodded to the grim-faced plain-clothed policeman ahead of me. After five more minutes, I thought I could see movement amongst the trees. "Ella?" More rustling, so that guns were drawn and we headed cautiously in that direction. I could hear muffled sounds, and my heart plummeted when I saw Ella, disheveled and bound to the tree behind her, sitting slumped sideways on the forest floor. "Ella!"
I rushed to undo her ties, and the gag that had been put into her mouth. Her eyes were closed, and her hair was plastered against her forehead and cheeks. But she appeared otherwise unharmed, and I was grateful for whatever had run through my twin's head to have stopped him from hurting her.
"Not so fast."
My head whipped around. Hans stood, a hunting gun ready, pointing towards me, signaling for me to move back. The policemen behind us must have made a move, because Hans fired a warning shot to the sky. Even then, even then, Ella didn't shriek or react in any way.
"Congratulations for finally it figuring out." His tone was reprimanding, as if I was a child caught with a mouthful of sweets. "Fourteen hours and twenty-two minutes since you came looking at midnight." He clucked his tongue. "You were always so predictable, Cole. If you had left an hour earlier, you might have caught us leaving the house."
I fixed my gaze on him, hatred and an uneasy feeling mingling inside me. I was unsure of how to proceed. But I needed to play this right, because Ella was still whimpering on and off, perhaps drifting in and out of consciousness. Was she dehydrated? Drugged, maybe? We needed to get her to the nearest hospital.
And so I said the only thing that made sense to ask. "Why?"
"Why what, Cole? Why did I take Ella here? Or why did I take Ella away from you?" His laugh was harsh, bitter. "You always were self-centered, Cole. It was always you who needed the attention. Poor Cole. He must be traumatized. Poor Cole, he was too young to understand what he had done to Nathan. Well, what about Hans? Didn’t anybody see that Hans needed attention too? But it was alright, I told myself. It was alright, because even though they showered attention on you, at least you gave me your all. You didn't play with anyone except me. I was the only one you wanted around."
His gaze turned steely. "Until they got you that stupid fish, and you spent all your time reading to it, or feeding it, or talking to it. it was a stupid fish, Cole. I am your brother. Your twin.” He spat onto the forest floor as if the disgust had left a bitter taste in his mouth.
“So I got rid of it, and then you remembered me again, and went back to playing with me. But then you saw that kitten in the pet shop, and despite me saying I wanted us to share a puppy, you insisted on getting it, and you named it yourself. You didn't even ask me what I thought, Cole.” Pure hatred shone in his eyes, and I couldn’t unsee it, not for the rest of my life.
“So it got what it deserved. And I made sure you saw it, so you knew not to make the same mistake again."
He paused, and I dared myself to look back. One of the officers was missing. I turned my attention ever so slowly to Hans, trying to see if the policeman had managed to get behind Hans. I couldn't see anything, the woods as empty as they were before.
"Things were good again. They were good again, Cole. We were brothers in the best sense of the word. Until Monica came. Frigid bitch deserved more than what I managed to do to her. And this one," he ran a finger down Ella's cheek, staining it a dark gray, "got your attention. You never learn, do you, Cole? I don't like to share. And you never seem to want to share your stuff with me, either."
"Hans. Ella...we can share her, man. You and I, we can each have a piece," I found myself saying. Anything, just to get us out of here, safe. "She thinks you're hot."
Interest gleamed in Hans' eyes, and I felt a ripple of relief run through me. I had gained some ground with him. We were going to be alright.
He smiled. "Too late. It's too late, Cole. You never did appreciate the things people did for you. That I did for you. You were always self-centered, Cole. And always will be."
Everything happened so fast I couldn't comprehend what I was seeing. One moment, Ella was slumped onto the ground, Hans pointing the gun towards her. The next moment, Hans dropped to the ground, gun pointing upwards, and a police officer stepped from behind the tree. Hans wouldn't go without a fight, however. I watched as he swung his leg to trip the guy, and managed to get back up and began throwing punches into his face. I ran towards him, just as several shots rang out, and saw that Hans had fallen backwards.
I couldn't describe the broken, gaping emptiness that grew and grew as I watch the wet, bloody patch spread rapidly on his shirt. His mouth gaped open, and his eyes slid to look at me. He smiled, a crooked, shit-eating grin, one so familiar to me that my heart ached, before he went completely still.
Chapter 27
Ella
There was a low, steady humming sound somewhere near my ear, almost like that of an insect buzzing, but my exhaustion was too complete for me to bother investigating. My mind whirred with half-formed thoughts, most of which I couldn't make heads or tails of. Thirsty - need water - burning pain. Then: early afternoon - better visibility - throat too raw. But after some time my brain had stopped worrying, and a sort of peace had overtaken me, so that when I next emerged, coming up for air, I realized I wasn't sitting on the damp, mossy forest floor anymore, but was instead lying supine on cotton sheets, the humming nearby taking shape further, the smells reminding me of chlorine and something equally clinical. I opened my eyes, and took a while to register the white ceiling, the steady drip, drip of the IV machine next to me. I was still thirsty, but no longer wanting to claw at my throat. My eyes adjusted further - it was dark in the room - a hospital room, with a sofa on one end and several chairs against the wall. My mom, nodding off in the corner, looking older than I had ever seen her before. Guilt - guilt overtook me, because I knew I had made her age like that overnight.
I tried sitting up, but found myself too weak, my arms useless by my sides. Cole, and Hans. The forest. What had happened? My last memory was of a twin's furtive glances at me, yet not approachi
ng me. My muffled shouts through the gag as I grew more and more tired. I couldn't remember anything else. Exhaustion pulled me under again, and I closed my eyes and let it sweep me away, back into that almost peaceful realm, where I continued chasing half-formed thoughts.
***
"Ella."
I opened my eyes, and my immediate reaction was to scream, my body jerking in fright at the face in front of me.
"It's Cole," he said quickly, even as his mouth tightened. "Ella, it's me. I...I just needed to see for myself that you were alright."
