by Cerys du Lys
*** Chastity
I knew what she was going to do. I followed her and Noah sometimes and I saw what she did to him. I found out, and I couldn’t let it happen anymore. Why was she so horrible? What did Noah ever do to her?
So I waited and I watched. She took him into the room they said was her bedroom. I wasn’t allowed in there, but I tried to go anyways. I pulled on the doorhandle, but it was locked and the door refused to budge. What sorts of terrible things was she doing to him? Was she torturing him? She was going to hurt him, and I knew it, but I was powerless to stop her.
I waited and watched. She left me to wander the halls of her house, but this was a bad idea on her part. I discovered things, and I learned from it. She kept weapons hidden in the house. I found that out by accident, but it was useful to know. I found a knife that was easy to hold. Now all I needed was a chance to stop her.
She took Noah to her torture chamber, holding his hand like they were friends. Of course they weren’t! Anyone could see that. He was too hurt to stop her, though. I promised myself I would save him and end this.
I followed them and I took the knife with me and I waited. I slipped into the room when she wasn’t looking and I hid in the shadows. She was too busy staring with disgust into Noah’s eyes to notice me. How could she hate him so much? Noah wasn’t a bad person. I just knew he wasn’t, but I didn’t know how she couldn’t see it? She said he would hurt me, so she was going to hurt him instead?
I watched and almost cried out in alarm when she started ripping out his fingernails. The worst part was it looked like she made him ask her to do it. What kind of sick person was she? The things she was doing to him were so horrible and wrong.
I waited and I watched and eventually I had a chance to jump into action. Noah closed his eyes and she leaned in close after she finished ripping out the last of his nails.
I stabbed her. I held the knife in my trembling hands and I shoved it as hard as I could into her side. She didn’t move at first. Was she dead? I thought about pulling the knife out and stabbing her again, but then she fell to the floor in a heap.
I won! Noah, we won! She was dead! I killed her and we were free now and we could leave together. We could be with one another. I saved him and now he would love me so much.
I tried to tell him this and I tried to hug him tight and let him know everything would be alright, but...
He choked me. He shoved me into the chair. He strapped me in so I couldn’t move. What... what was going on? What was he doing?
“Fuck off,” he said. “I didn’t ask for your help. I didn’t fucking want your help. You don’t fucking understand and you’ll never understand. Just sit there, shut the fuck up, and leave me the fuck alone.”
What did he mean? I stared at him, my bottom lip trembling, tears covering my cheeks and snot dripping from my nose. Noah, what’s wrong? Why don’t you understand?
He bent down to pick that woman up. What, why? Why was he helping her? I cried and begged and pleaded with him to understand. She wasn’t nice. He shouldn’t help her. Put her down, Noah. Come back. Help me. Save me. I saved you. I helped you. I came for you.
He didn’t listen. I struggled to scream but my voice turned into a garbled mess of guttural nonsense. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t do anything but cry and scream and watch him carry her away.
I watched and waited, but I didn’t know what I was waiting for anymore. Why was this happening?
*** Noah
My fucking hand hurts. This fucking shit hurts so fucking bad. I try to ignore it, but I can’t. It hurts more because I’m doing every fucking thing I can to carry Angeline through the halls. Where the fuck do I go? Is there a goddamn phone here? I need to call for help. Send a fucking ambulance. Get me a fucking doctor.
I shout and curse, spewing forth a constant stream of obscenities. Fuck shit fucking whore asshole fucker prick hell bitch slut. What the fuck am I doing? What the fuck good is this going to do?
One of them comes. Some fucking guy. He’s probably one of the ones who she keeps here. Fuck you, buddy. Yeah, maybe your mistress is dying over here, but fuck you if you think that’s a good thing. I’ll fucking kill you if you try to escape. You can’t fucking leave.
How the fuck am I going to kill him? How the fuck am I going to stop him from doing whatever the fuck he wants? I can’t. There’s no way. It’s impossible right now.
There’s more of them. They all come. Maybe not all of them. I don’t know how many there are. Fuck. Fuck you. I stare at them like a rabid fucking dog, ready to snap and pounce and sink my teeth into their fucking throats until I saw through their jugular and they die.
One of them comes up to me and I want to punch him in the fucking face, but my hands are full. They never fucking talk. What the fuck is this asshole going to say now? Gloat over Angeline bleeding out on the floor? I’m leaving a goddamn breadcrumb trail of her blood in the hallway. She’s fucking dying.
“Come,” he says to me. “Hurry.
“Who the fuck are you?” I ask. It’s not much of a question.
He says some shit to a few of the others. It sounds impressive. Who the fuck is this guy?
Once he’s done ordering people around, he turns back to me. “Do you want to save her?”
I stare at him like he’s a fucking idiot. “What the fuck do you think?”
He smiles. “Good. Come, then. Hurry. We don’t have a lot of time.”
I don’t know if I trust him, but I don’t have a lot of options, either. I follow him through the halls. He guides me to somewhere. Fuck if I know where we’re going. I haven’t been given free reign of the place, so the entire fucking house is a mystery. I might as well be in a mirror maze at a carnival.
Angeline is breathing. I can feel her breathing in my arms. She’s bleeding and her eyes are shut, but she’s still alive. We need to get this fucking knife out of her. I can’t just pull it out, though. She’ll bleed more. She’s bleeding enough as it is. She needs this.
I don’t know why the fuck I do what I do, but while I hurry the fuck down the halls and cradle her in my arms, I bend my head down close to her wound. I lick at her side, tasting her blood. It’s what dogs do, right? They lick each other’s wounds? How the fuck does that work?
She loves it. She loves blood. I didn’t understand it, but maybe there’s more to it. Maybe it wasn’t about being a sick fucking psychotic bitch freak, you know? Yeah, it’s fucked up, and I think anyone can admit that. Angeline pretty much said as much herself. She understood how fucked up she is. Just because you understand something doesn’t mean you can stop. Smokers know cigarettes are bad for you, but what the fuck do they keep doing every chance they get? They go outside and they fucking smoke their cancer sticks. Everyone’s got issues. Everyone has a vice.
Maybe Angeline isn’t so bad, though. Maybe it’s her way of being loving. I kind of think it is, too. She wasn’t mean about it. Mostly. I mean, she did fucking bite my lip and then slam my head against a wall and beat the shit out of me while licking and kissing blood off my mouth. Those were fucking love taps. Also, I was being a fucking asshole. Not sure what else to fucking say about that.
Other times she was seriously really fucking nice, though. Gentle as fuck is all I can say about that. Yeah, the blood drinking is twisted, like she’s a vampire, but it’s not like she pours it into a fucking wine glass. We’re wild fucking dogs. We were left on the street, kicked and abused, fed scraps, doing every fucking thing possible to survive. We live in the dark fucking back alley of the world, fighting for every fucking inch of space we can get. We are sick, rabid fucking animals.
And she just wanted to be close to me. She fucking missed me. She wanted to lick my fucking wounds because she knew how much it hurt. She wanted me to heal so that I could help her heal, too.
Yeah, fuck you. It’s sick and fucking twisted, but who the fuck are you to judge? You don’t know shit. You don’t know how this is. You can’t fucking relate. You’re probably as bad as Chastity White and
you can just go fuck yourself. I’m going to fucking save her. I refuse to let her die. Once she’s healed, if I start to bleed and she wants to help me, I’ll give her every fucking drop.
My blood and bones and body and my fucking soul are hers. I will fucking kill myself before I deny her anything.
*** Noah
We go to some fucking room somewhere. I don’t recognize it at first, but then it hits me. It’s the same fucking room I was in after she knocked me out the first day I was here. It was where she fed me soup, then smothered me with a pillow until I lost consciousness. Fuck. Those are some good memories.
Angeline and I are fucked up.
There’s people here. They’re setting shit up. The guy I followed stands next to me and points to the bed.
“Lay her there, Noah,” he says.
How the fuck does he know my name? I don’t have time to figure anything out. I bring her to the bed. There’s fresh white sheets and that stupid fucking rain chime ambient noise machine is playing. I’m not sure if it’s relaxing or if I want to throw it out the fucking window. It’s kind of relaxing. I know that Angeline liked it. I guess I’ll leave it the fuck alone for now.
The sheets were fresh and white and clean, but not for long. They soak up her blood, turning crimson and dark.
“You want to tell me what the fuck is going on?” I ask.
“I’m a doctor,” he says. “Or, I was one. The wound doesn’t look too deep, though it’s difficult to tell. I’ll have to do some preliminary work, but if I can bandage her up soon, she’ll have a good chance of recovery.”
“You’re a doctor?” I ask. “You? A fucking doctor?”
He stares at me like I’m a fucking idiot. Maybe I am.
“Do you have an issue with that?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say. “Yeah, I fucking do. Why the fuck do you want to help her? Aren’t you one of her slaves or some shit?”
He nods. “You could call me that.”
“What the fuck is your name?” Who the fuck is this guy?
“I don’t have a name anymore,” he says. The strange part is that he doesn’t sound sad about that. It sounds like he’s fucking happy to be a nameless asshole.
“I asked you what the fuck your name was,” I say again.
Yeah, I completely understand I’m being unreasonable and an asshole. I’m sorry. What the fuck do you want me to say? I’m stressed out.
“Jerry,” he says. “Please, listen. I owe Angeline everything. My life was a mess. I caused a lot of problems. I drank. I was an alcoholic. I still am, I suppose, but that’ll never matter. I’ve stopped drinking. She found me and she saved me. Yes, her methods are somewhat extreme, but I’m thankful. I could have killed someone. I didn’t care. I thought my life was terrible so I’d go into surgery when I was drunk, and somehow it mostly worked out, because I was lucky. I have no doubts that I was half a step away from accidentally ending someone’s life. Angeline stopped me before I could. She found me and she brought me here and she’s given me a new life. I don’t expect you to understand right now, but I want to save her, too. I owe her everything.”
I don’t know who the fuck this guy is. Jerry, he says. I don’t know who the fuck he is but he sounds like a nice guy. Maybe. Sort of. Nice for a fucking asshole. I’m an asshole, too. I can relate to that. I feel like we’ve bonded.
“Go fucking save her then,” I say. “If she dies I’ll fucking kill you.”
“I’ll try,” he says. “I’ll do as much as I can.”
“Go!” I shoo him away. He smiles before he leaves.
I don’t know what the fuck to do now, though. Do I stand here and watch? What the fuck happens if she dies? There’s hospital machines. Where the fuck did those come from? It’s nothing too fancy, but an EKG and some other shit I don’t know the name of. Respirator mask? Breathing apparatus? I don’t fucking know.
I can’t fucking watch this. I walk outside in a goddamn fucking daze.
She’s going to die. He says he’s going to save her, but he didn’t even promise. He said he’d try. What the fuck does that mean? Am I supposed to hope for the best? I don’t believe in that. Fuck hope. I want him to fucking do it. I want her to live. I want her alive. Forever. I don’t fucking care if that’s impossible. If it doesn’t fucking happen I will end the entire world. I’ll fucking burn the whole place down. Everything.
*** Noah?
“I’m sorry.”
Where the fuck am I? I’m in a bed. Fuck, what bed is this? Oh. It’s my room at Angeline’s place. It’s where the psychotic bitch kept me chained and isolated. I look at my arms and notice I’m chained up again. What the fuck?
“I know this is going to be hard to take in,” the guy says. “I tried my best. There wasn’t anything I could do, though. Angeline has passed on.”
I stare at him. Is this some sick fucking joke?
“I’m sorry,” he says again. “I honestly did everything I could.”
I bare my teeth at him and I growl like a fucking wolf. That’s exactly what I am right now. I fly off the bed. I’m going to strangle the fuck out of this asshole. He lied to me. You can’t fucking lie to me! You said you were going to save her, you sick fucking prick. I thought you were a doctor! What the fuck use are you if you can’t do your fucking job?
I try to strangle him, but the chains keep me in place. Motherfucker. Fuck you! I strain and pull against my shackles, trying to rip them away. The harsh metal digs into my wrists. I start to bleed as the cuffs scrape roughly against my skin. I’m fucking pulling with all my strength. My face is red and tears streak down my cheeks, partially from pain and anguish, and partially from intense fucking exertion.
I will fucking kill you. She’s dead? You’re all going to fucking die. Who the fuck are you? This is a sick fucking joke. Where the fuck is Chastity White? I’m going to kill that bitch, too. I’m going to fucking burn this entire house down.
Fuck you. This is disgusting. What the fuck kind of ending is this?
She fucking asked me. She said it. Do you wish to live happily ever after?
You know what I fucking said in reply? I said fuck if I know. And you know what? That was a goddamn fucking lie. I knew. I know. I know the exact fucking answer to that question.
YES. Fuck you, Angeline. YES. You can’t fucking die. How the fuck did you die? From a fucking knife wound? It’s just a fucking knife, love. It’s just a knife. Why are you dead? Don’t leave me. Don’t hurt me like this. Just... don’t... please?
I’m alone in the darkness and I’m crying and I can’t breathe anymore and my eyes are closed and I want to die and...
“Noah?”
The fuck?
There’s the beautiful fucking voice of an angel in my ear. “Noah?” she says again. “Are you having a bad dream?”
Life is a bad dream, love. I’m busy dying. Leave me alone.
There’s light. That’s how this shit works. Go to the light. I can see it behind closed eyes, piercing through my eyelids, blinding me. Fuck you, God. I’m dealing with a lot of shit right now. I’m going, alright? Hold your fucking heavenly horses. I’m going into the fucking light, but can you tone it down a bit? It doesn’t have to be that fucking bright.
I open my eyes and the sun is glaring at me through the window. Where the fuck am I? Heaven looks really fucking shitty. I thought there were supposed to be clouds and hot angel bitches in togas?
Whoa shit, I spoke too soon. Who the fuck is that? There’s a hot angel bitch in a white nightgown laying next to me, staring at me. She’s not wearing a toga, but it’ll do. I’m cold and sweaty, but I don’t even fucking care. I stare at her.
“Did you have a bad dream?” she asks.
“Are you dead?” I ask. “Did I die, too? I don’t remember.”
She scrunches up her brow. Fuck, she’s cute. “No, we are alive. You saved me.”
“I didn’t save you. That guy saved you.”
“Jerry,” Angeline says. “Yes.”
&
nbsp; “Fucker lied. He said he didn’t have a name.”
“We do not use our real names here. They can be painful. We will make new names for ourselves.”
“I don’t get it,” I say.
I do, though. It makes sense in a fucked up way. Sometimes you need to leave everything behind, even your name. For whatever fucking reason, sometimes you need to become a new person. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, it just is. It’s something that exists. If it didn’t exist, we’d be trapped forever and lost in a life that wants to destroy us. Making a new name for yourself might not always be a good thing, but sometimes it’s better than the alternatives.
“Do you want me to explain?” she asks.
“Not right now,” I say. “I want to kiss you.”
“You do?” She sounds interested.
“Fuck yes.”
“You may, but you will need to be gentle. I have bandages.”
“Yeah, well, I feel like I can barely fucking move, so I don’t think I’m going to be too rough, love.”
“Will you be rough after we are healed?” she asks.
I don’t understand what she means at first, but then I see my hand with the broken finger wrapped up in bandages. I was bloody and bleeding, and my finger was still broken. I guess carrying her didn’t do me any favors, either. I didn’t have a choice, but by the looks of it I fucked up my finger even more. Thankfully, I can’t feel it now. My hand is bound up tight. I might be on painkillers. Fuck if I know.
“I’ll kiss you gently right now, love,” I say. “After, though? I don’t care about this.” I wave my bandaged hand around. “Once you get your bandages off, I’m going to fuck you hard. You’re going to fucking love it. I’m not going to stop until you fucking squeal and beg and moan in fucking agony.”
“I do not know why I will moan in agony,” she says. “I believe I will enjoy it...”
“Yeah, that’s what you think at first, but I’m going to fuck you raw for hours, love. By the time I’m done with you, you won’t know the difference between pleasure and pain. It’s all going to feel the same. You’re going to hurt so fucking good.”
