Chained

by Escalera, Tessa

  “But what...”

  “When the babe comes out, I want you to use this.” She pressed a spoon into my hand, the handle sharpened into a spike that felt razor-sharp.

  “What is this for?”

  Even though she was in the midst of a contraction, Jenny fixed my eyes with hers. Her voice was barely more than a whisper. “I want you to cut him. Not enough to damage, but it needs to leave a scar. If he's not perfect, they will let me keep him. Please, please, Sarah promise me. Promise me you won't let them take my baby.”

  My throat hurt too much to speak. I can't do this...hurt a baby? No, I can't.

  But then that little whisper that persisted despite my best efforts to keep from hearing. You have to. You want the man who hurt you to take that little baby, and do who knows what with it? You'll never forgive yourself if you let that happen. You have to do this.

  And so, with tears streaming down my face, I held Jenny's hand as she writhed and groaned in the grip of her contractions. I wasn't a midwife. I had no idea what I was doing. I had never even been in the delivery room when a baby was born. Yes, I'd seen birth in movies, but this was nothing like a movie. Jenny didn't scream, there was no posse of nurses and doctors urging her on, encouraging her. Just a pale, thin girl on a hard cot, biting her lip until it bled. Her travail was a combination of primal ferocity and hopeless pain that exhausted me to the very core of my being...and I was only the one watching.

  In the long hours I waited. I brought water. I placed cold washcloths on her forehead. And I prayed. God, please protect her. Please let the baby be born alive. Please let Jenny be okay. I don't know how to do this. Please let me know what to do.

  And amazingly, a sort of peace settled over me as the clock ticked ever forward. If Jenny's markings on the calendar were correct, it was September 20th. 5:32. Probably evening, based upon the light outside.

  At 6:01, the pitch of Jenny's groans changed. They became deeper, stronger. She was curled around her belly, her hands below her thighs, pulling her legs back toward her shoulders.

  “I need...you to look,” she panted. “Baby's coming.”

  “I, are you sure? You want me to look there?”

  “Just look!” She roared, and I hurried to obey. At first I was cringing, not sure what I was seeing. I would never in a thousand years have imagined myself helping someone give birth. Medical subjects had never been something I was interested in.

  It quickly became evident that I was seeing the baby's head. I put my hands out to catch the little body as it slid into the world. With one final push Jenny fell back, gasping for breath.

  “Hurry,” she panted. “Before it cries.”

  “I can't..”

  “Please, Sarah! Do it now!”

  Tears sprang to my eyes as I took the sharpened spoon in my hand. My heart thudded wildly as I cradled the tiny baby in my arms, her body limp and barely pink.

  “Do it!”

  With a small cry, I laid the sharp end to the baby's cheek and drew it down, leaving a dark red mark from corner of her eye to the edge of her perfect, rosebud mouth. Blood beaded on the cut. My stomach roiled, and I was afraid I would be sick.

  With a huge gasp, the baby began to wail. She screamed with all the indignity she could muster, her cries echoing from the concrete walls. Jenny laughed breathlessly and reached for the baby, which I wrapped in a blanket and handed to her.

  At the same moment of the baby's cry Travis burst through the door. I pushed the spoon into the crack between the cot and the wall. The “Master” followed close on Travis's heels, pushing past him to reach Jenny first. Travis had his arms full of what looked like towels, which he set on the floor by my feet.

  The older man took the baby from Jenny's arms. I pressed myself back into the wall, hoping he wouldn't notice me. I looked at Jenny, who stayed silent, a gleam of defiance in her eyes. She watched as the Master unwrapped the baby.

  A loud growl, and the Master shoved the baby into my arms. I cradled the wailing little girl against my chest, fighting back tears of fear.

  The Master leaned over and shook Jenny by the shoulders. “What have you done? “

  Jenny spoke calmly, steadily. As if all the fear I knew she held did not exist. “It happened during the birth. An accident. It could not be prevented.”

  The man pulled back and raised his hand. He slapped Jenny—hard. Her eyes glistened with tears, but she stayed silent. He roared, and raised his hand again.

  Without thinking, I leaped up, the baby still in my arms. “Wait!” I shouted. Stupid. You are so stupid. “It was my fault. I've never delivered a baby before. It was me. Please don't hurt her.”

  Snarling, the Master took the baby from my arms and deposited her, wailing, on the bed. He grasped my arms with fingers like iron and shook me, his breath hot and foul in my face. “Fool! Worthless, stupid girl! Do you know what you've done?”

  Don't fight. Don't respond. Don't scream. Don't cry. I fought the terror in my throat, the pounding of my heart that made my head swim. The blood was leaving my face, leaving my brain. My stomach twisted violently.

  The Master shoved me, a motion I was not prepared for, and I fell. My tailbone hit the floor with jarring force that made my whole body seize with pain.

  “Get up! You stupid, worthless...” There were other words, words I will not repeat. Stinging on my cheek. Desperately I bit my lips, praying silently. I cried out to the God I had for so long denied. I cried wordlessly, begging for the pain to stop, but also desperate to keep him from hurting the new mother or the innocent little one that cried on the cot. Time seemed to slow. Each blow was years apart, shuddering through my body in avalanches of pain. I think I passed out, because eventually I couldn't feel the pain anymore. I only knew I had fallen when the blows turned into kicks. My legs, my ribs, my back. I curled into a ball and waited for it to end, as I prayed for mercy.

  Gradually I realized that the only pain I was feeling was the throbbing of my wounds, and the catch of my breath in a throat raw from crying. I let go of my knees and slowly, tenderly straightened my limbs and rolled onto my back. I lay there, staring at the concrete ceiling, at the swinging of the light bulb chain.

  “Jenny?”

  “I'm here.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “I'm okay. The baby too. You saved us, Sarah.”

  Chapter 7: Hope—the most dangerous lie

  Day 3:

  Travis will let me go into Jenny's room twice a day, she says. I help her change dressings for her bleeding, help her take a bath, hold the baby while she eats.

  I never knew having babies meant so much blood. Jenny says it's normal, but she looks so pale. Almost like a ghost. It scares me. What if she dies? What happens to the baby?

  Travis says I shouldn't have gone against the Master. He says I'm lucky to be alive. Jenny says the same thing, and I want to hate her for letting this happen to me. If she hadn't told me to make the baby “imperfect”, I wouldn't have been beaten. But then I look down at that innocent little face, and I know exactly why she did it. And I also know that I would do it all again. I don't know what happens to the other babies, but it can't be good.

  Now I know what the crying from Annabelle's cell is. It's her daughter. Annabelle cries too. She doesn't answer me anymore. She just sings nursery rhymes in a falsetto voice, and then she laughs. She sounds like a crazy person from an asylum.

  I have to get out of here. There has to be a way out. Jenny says the only way out is to die. But there has to be another way. I have to find it...for my sake, for the sake of Jenny and her baby, and Annabelle and her daughter. There has to be a way out. Please God, show me the way out.

  Day 4:

  Jenny is holding on. She looks so weak. The baby cries a lot. I think it makes the Master angry. He went in Annabelle's cell last night, and she cried for a long time afterward.

  I'm so tired. The cold is in my bones. It's in my soul. I have bruises on top of bruises. My body is a mosaic of pain. I want to
go to sleep and wake up free. I want to sleep forever.

  Day 5:

  He tells me I'm worthless. He tells me no one wants me. That he is the only one who will care for me. He says my parents have deserted me, leaving him to waste his money on preserving my worthless life.

  I almost believe him sometimes. No one is looking for us. No one has come to rescue us. And Jenny...poor sweet Jenny, who has been here for years. Surely she had a family, parents, people she loved. Why haven't they come for her?

  God, why won't you save us? Do you hate me too? Is this my punishment for not believing in you?

  It was my turn again tonight. I didn't fight. I didn't struggle. I didn't wipe my tears. I swallowed the screams. And he didn't beat me.

  Then why do I still want to die? I used to think rape was just a violation of the body. I was wrong.

  He has torn into my very soul. Is that why you won't save me, God? Am I too dirty for Someone like you to love? Maybe no one can ever love me again. I'm not sure I want them to.

  Please, God, let this end.

  Day 8:

  Today I stood naked in front of my mirror. I looked at myself, and a stranger stared back at me. The places that used to be soft and round, they are turning into angles and points. Travis says I have to eat. But I'm not hungry anymore. I'm just tired...and cold. So, so cold.

  God, please deliver us. Bring us out of evil. Set us free, God, or let us die. I can't live like this anymore.

  The next day, I was cradling the baby while Jenny bathed. I stared down at the pink fat cheeks, one marred by the red track of the wound I had caused, the perfect tiny rosebud of her mouth. The baby grasped my finger with one chubby fist while sucking on the other.

  “Jenny?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Does she have a name? The baby?'

  Jenny appeared in the doorway to the bathroom, clad in the ever-present faded nightgown. “Hannah.”

  I stroked Hannah's little cheek delicately with my fingernail, tracing the puckered mark where I had cut her. The cut was deep—even with stitches it wouldn't have healed cleanly, and sweet little Hannah would always bear the scar. But I supposed that had been the whole point...if the cut had been any less, Jenny would have lost yet another one of her children.

  Jenny came and sat down beside me on the cot. I handed her the baby and watched as Jenny tenderly cradled her little one in her arms.

  “Is she named after someone?”

  Jenny reached over to her desk and picked up a book, which she pressed into my hands. It was a Bible, worn and faded from much use. “Hannah was a woman who could not have children. And she cried out to God, and prayed for a child. She said that if God would just grant her a son, she would devote his life to God's service.” Jenny leaned over and kissed her daughter's head. “I have prayed, and begged God to be allowed to keep my baby. Even though I had a plan, I couldn't know until the moment of her birth if it would work. If you would have the strength to do what I asked. And even then, Master could have taken her. He could have killed me for defying him. I begged God for my plan to work. And it did...He gave me a daughter, and her name will forever remind me of my joy that has come from my pain.” She looked up at me and her eyes were filled with tears. “You were braver than I. You claimed responsibility, though you knew the consequence. You have a strength that I will never have.”

  “You mean a stupidity you will never have,” I said wryly.

  At this, Jenny threw back her head and laughed. “Sometimes the two qualities are less different than you might think.”

  Day 9: I don't understand how someone who has seen so much pain can manage to find joy or happiness anywhere. All the pro-choice people that I have known, Mary, Ms. Sanchez at school, they argue that what about the women who have children because of rape? Shouldn't they have the option not to be reminded of their rapist every day of their life?

  But what if you see your rapist's face every day? I have never seen such love on a face as I did on Jenny's as she looked at her daughter. She doesn't care about how her daughter was conceived. All she cares about is that her baby is safe in her arms.

  How can you love something that came from such an awful act? How can you look at that tiny face, so innocent and perfect, and NOT love her, no matter where or who she came from?

  I don't understand. I don't understand any of this. The Bible lies next to me as I write. Maybe it holds the answers. God, is this your answer?

  That night, I fell asleep reading the Bible that Jenny had given me.

  ***

  “Sarah?” Jenny was sitting next to me on the cot, watching me as I held Hannah.

  “Yeah?”

  She looked down and picked at a loose thread on her gown. “I'm sorry to ask this, but I think I should. You've been here for nearly two weeks. I know that Master has been to your cell. At what point should you begin to be concerned that you may be pregnant?”

  The question stopped me cold. “What?” I looked at the calendar, ice growing in my stomach. “I...I'm not sure. Surely it wouldn't happen now...I know stress can affect these things....”

  “I found out I was pregnant less than a month after being taken. It is possible.”

  I thought back, trying to remember my life before the endless darkness of captivity. It seemed like I was trying to remember a book or a movie, not my own life—something I had seen but that wasn't quite real. My thoughts were in no way comforting.

  Jenny must have seen the look on my face. She reached under her cot and pulled out a brown paper bag. “Take this, and use it when you need to. I understand if you don't want to know. But if you want to, you can.”

  At that moment Travis returned to take me back to my cell. I took the bag and handed Hannah back to Jenny. Jenny hugged me briefly.

  Day 12: I was just starting to feel hope again. The Bible tells me that all things work together to those who belong to God. It tells me not to fear. I don't know if I belong to God yet, but I want to. I want to know the peace that Jenny has. I want some hope that someday this will all end, that I will see the sky and the sun again.

  But this...this is too much. I put the test on the back of my toilet, and there it sits...taunting me. I won't take it yet. It's too early anyway.

  There is a rug on my floor now. A couple of novels sit on my desk, and more paper. I have socks, and towels, and another pillow. Travis brings me new things almost every day, even if I don't ask. I look into his eyes and I hope to see...I don't know what I think I will see. But I have to think he cares. Maybe eventually he can be persuaded to help us escape. He is so gentle, and so kind. Except for the fact that he works for a man that surely must be possessed by a demon, for how else could one man be so evil?

  I am scaring myself. Sometimes I almost relax, I almost start to feel like this is my home. It frightens me how easily I have gotten used to the horrors here. Is this God's peace, or is this some sort of death of my senses? Am I going crazy? Maybe I need to be crazy to survive in here. If I escape, will I even be able to live in the real world? Or will I be so used to the dark and the cold and the loneliness that I won't ever be able to truly live again?

  The next morning, when Travis brought my breakfast, he seemed unsettled. I sat unmoving on my cot as I always did, holding my blankets tight around me. Once he had put the tray down he turned to leave, but hesitated and instead sat in the folding chair and turned it to face me.

  He had left the door open. Travis began to speak, but all that I noticed was that my door stood wide open, as if beckoning me to freedom. With great effort I tore my eyes away from it, knowing that if Travis noticed my glance, my chance of escape would disappear. My heart was pounding so hard in my ears that I could barely hear what he was saying.

  “Sarah. Butterfly, did you hear me?”

  “What?”

  “I asked if there is anything you need.”

  The stupid part of my brain took over and I blurted out what first flashed into my head. “Yeah. I need to get out of here.”<
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  “You know I can't do that.”

  “A phone then. Internet. Let me talk to my parents.”

  Travis shook his head. “Why are you asking me for things you know I can't give you?”

  “Why are you keeping us here?” I nearly shouted in his face. “Why won't you let us go?”

  “You wouldn't understand.”

  “Try me! Tell me what possible reason there could be for kidnapping, and raping a bunch of girls and taking their babies away! Tell me why!”