No Center Line

by Lois RH Balzer

  Morrison interrupted. “Blair, I would prefer it if you were to tell me.”

  “No. Jim can.” Sandburg closed his eyes, dismissing the doctor.

  Ellison could fee his heart rate climbing, the slight shivers that shook him. “Does it matter?” he asked the doctor.

  Morrison considered it, then shook his head. “Okay, Blair. But I want you to tell me if he says anything that is wrong.”

  Sandburg shrugged, then nodded, then said nothing during the standard questions that were asked about his medical history, allergies, past surgeries, and so on. Ellison answered them all, reciting hospital stays and reasons with precise, short replies. But then the questions were more direct, and his partner could no longer answer for him. Morrison questioned about what he had eaten that day, and he finally answered, “I don’t know. I don’t remember. I’m not hungry.”

  More questions about his last consensual sexual experience, any drugs or alcohol he may have had in the last few days, or if he remembered being sexually or physically attacked were left unanswered. It was all too difficult to remember. He turned his head and looked back at Ellison. The sentinel. There was a comfort in seeing him sitting there, listening. Jim will remember. He’ll take care of it for me. I’m sorry, Jim. I can’t remember. I’m too tired. Take care of it all for me.

  Ellison met the doctor’s eyes, then nodded for him to continue. Morrison performed the necessary tests, oral examination, fingernail scrapings, genital and rectal examinations, samples, swabs, and body scrapings — everything that was necessary to document a sexual attack and possibly identify the assailant. Blair remained silent through the entire procedure. If he didn’t acknowledge it, maybe it hadn’t happened. If he didn’t think about it, didn’t dwell on it, it might fade away altogether. His eyes didn’t want to stay open, anyway.

  As the rest of the questioning progressed, Sandburg became increasingly withdrawn, shivering beneath the blanket once the physical examination was over, wanting to be warm. He remembered briefly being warm. In the car, with Jim. And that other man. Before that, he remembered being cold. He remembered hurting. Being afraid. He remembered struggling to breathe. A knife. A knife ���

  He opened his eyes quickly, but he was in the hospital. Hands touched him, gentle hands, but they weren’t Jim’s. He knew they were safe hands, because Jim was sitting there calmly. Jim wasn’t worried about this man touching him, so Blair tried not to be worried either. But the worry crept up on him anyway, until he was shivering. He felt Ellison sit him up and he pushed back into the enfolding embrace. He’d let his pride and self-sufficiency surface another day. At this moment he just wanted to be safe and he wanted to be warm and Ellison would provide both unhesitantly.

  “Blair?” Morrison said, finally. “We’re all done here. Would you like to get cleaned up? We can wash your hair, too, and try to get rid of that smell.”

  The smell. That’s what that was. But not just a smell, it was a taste, too. He could taste the smell. He wanted to brush his teeth, rinse out his mouth. Now that it had been brought to his attention, the smell was overpowering, tainting the clean air he breathed in. Hands over his eyes, Blair coughed, gagged a few times, then turned his head toward Jim. “I just want out of here.”

  Ellison’s arms squeezed him gently. “Do you want a shower? I can help you.”

  He nodded. “I feel gross.”

  “That’s understandable.” Morrison helped him to his feet, then Ellison took his place, steadying him as he struggled to stay upright. His knees alternately locked and buckled, but finally he tottered unaided. It felt like a small triumph, a step in the road to recovery. A literal first step.

  Morrison stood in front of him, disconnecting the monitors, removing the sticky little patches in the middle of the shaved spots on his chest. “Can you stand on your own? Good. Looks like the drugs are almost out of your system. Blair, there’s one more thing I need from you.”

  “Urine sample, right?” Sandburg said, wearily, looking down at the blue blanket he had been lying on. Ellison was wrapping the other one around him like a toga.

  Morrison smiled. “How’d you know?”

  “Experience.”

  The doctor directed him into the tiny bathroom attached to the examination room, then handed him a clear plastic cup and a lid. Sandburg shut the door.

  Then, in a rushed panic, he opened the door, his hand shaking. He looked at Jim, not knowing how to ask his question because he wasn’t sure what his question was. Jim knew, though.

  “How about we leave the door open a crack, and I’ll guard it for you? That sound okay, Chief?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We’ll go to the motel as soon as we’re done here. We can get some sleep then, okay?

  “Okay.” He turned away, taking care of the urine sample and leaving it on the shelf above the sink as he had been instructed. The bathtub wasn’t very big. It was more of a shower with a little tub beneath it. He didn’t want to step into it. He drew the blanket closer around his body and looked down at the tub. “Jim?”

  “What’s wrong?” Ellison asked, from the other side of the partially open door.

  “Bath at motel?”

  “Sure.”

  Sandburg stood in the bathroom, lost, a washcloth in his hand, until Ellison reached in and drew him out again.

  *

  *

  Three days previous

  Mid-day

  The Warehouse

  Evan Cortez froze, half-hunched over, as one end of his ankle chain was released, and then the buckles on the back of his head gear were unlatched. The gag fell from his mouth. His jaw ached. He was still pulling the mask off his face when he realized he was in a different room than he had been held in before. Instead of a narrow room with a mat on the floor, this windowless room was roughly twenty feet square, a kitchenette along the back wall with a sink, a stove and a small fridge. To his right, a table and two chairs. To his left a bed, where Karl was unlocking a chain from around the metal bed frame. Evan’s dark eyes fastened on the young man lying twisted on the bed.

  Blair Sandburg from Cascade.

  Strange how they were all reduced to names and locations. Before this, if he’d had to put a city with his name, it would be the city where he had been born and raised, where his family still lived. He had always been ‘Evan Cortez from Chicago’, but for the last few weeks, he had been ‘Evan Cortez from San Francisco.’ At least that was better than the names that these psychos called him.

  Or the names he called himself. Coward. Inept. Spineless.

  He knew he had given up, that these men had broken something inside him. He did not exist as a person in their minds, and the concept was slowly invading his own thoughts. He had no value. No worth. Evan Cortez was used, soiled goods. His body, his mind, and now, his spirit were defiled.

  Drugs, he had to remind himself. You feel this way because you were drugged. But it didn’t change how he felt. The degradation ate at him, just as it would eat at this other man. Blair Sandburg from Cascade, a city he had never been to. He’d never even been to Oregon. Evan vacationed in Chicago, or south of the border. Once in New Orleans. But he had never been in this area, before now.

  Welcome to Washington.

  Somewhere, at the state border, there was probably a sign that said that. Welcome to Washington.

  And here he stood, naked in a room with three other men, two of whom had watched as pictures were taken of him that morning. He had been bound in ropes and suspended from the ceiling, he remembered that, but there were other things that had happened that he could scarcely remember. The drugs had their benefits.

  Karl stopped whatever he was doing with the locks and moved across to the doorway of the room. “Hey, star. You with me here? Or are you still in LaLa land?”

  “I’m here,” he said, then coughed as his dry throat reacted. He was still coughing when something flew across the room and hit him in the face. He wrenched his neck trying to avoid what turned out to b
e his gray sweatsuit.

  “Put it on. No need to give him a free show.” Karl said, gesturing to Sandburg with this head. “It’ll be his turn soon enough. Pete’s gone for supplies, but he’ll have a real appetite when he gets back.”

  Evan held the clothes in front of him. He was so used to being naked now, that he hardly noticed it unless someone mentioned it. The sweatsuit felt like it was his, the only damned thing that belonged to him. They’d taken his watch, his rings, his gun, his clothes. The only thing they had left were his earrings. They had assigned him the pair of sweats. Gray. Everyone had a different color. His were gray. For some reason, every time he was taken out of his room, he returned to find the sweatsuit had been laundered. Sometimes it was even warm from the dryer. They were the same ones—he had checked them at first, but the snags were always the same, the slight rip in one cuff, and after the first week, he had thought of them as his.

  One day he had lain on his mat on the floor and held the freshly dried sweatshirt and sweatpants to his chest, seeking comfort from the illusion of warmth, not daring to imagine anything beyond the simple, basic, creature-comfort that probably had nothing more to it then Jurgen not wanting to catch anything from them. The same reason he was forced to shower twice a day. And take vitamins. And eat food.

  “Hey, star. I said to get dressed. Am I going to have to help you?” Karl’s voice was grating.

  Evan shook his head, then turned his back and struggled into the clothing. He had great difficulty getting his foot, with its long chain and cuff attached to his ankle, through the leg hole of the pants, but after several tries, he accomplished it, tugging the chain out. The cuffs hadn’t come off since that first day when they had been attached to his ankles.

  “Turn around,” Karl demanded.

  Evan turned to face him, standing stiffly upright, knowing that any attempt to retain his dignity was usually shot down. Humiliation was the name of today’s game. His eyes widened slightly to see Metzger, the man with the scars, standing with Karl.

  “Hands on top of your head,” Metzger snapped. “Karl, lock up his ankle chains.”

  Evan wanted to tell them it wasn’t necessary, but the gun Metzger produced kept him quiet.

  Karl threaded the lock through the chain and the ankle cuff, and snapped it closed.

  “Clean him up, star,” Metzger directed Evan, pointing to Sandburg. “He stinks. I don’t want to deal with Pete if he gets angry. Pete gets fussy, and for some reason he likes this one.”

  “You have twenty minutes,” Karl added, as he shut the door, locked it, and they walked away.

  Evan groaned, trying to push back the headache he knew from experience would grow to monolithic proportions. Whatever drug it was they gave him was wearing him down. He hated the way it made him feel — dreamlike, lethargic, apathetic about what was happening to him. Too tired to do anything else, he dropped into one of the chairs and stared across at Blair. Then pulled himself to his feet, when he realize that Blair was awake, blue eyes pleading with him. “Sorry, kid.” He stumbled across the room, sitting at the edge of the mattress. “I’m going to take your restraints off, okay?”

  Blair nodded, staying virtually motionless while Evan’s hands fumbled with the buckles of the leather arm restraints. That done, he reached for the gag, unbuckling the catches at the back of Blair’s head, then gently pulling the balled gag from the young man’s mouth.

  “—anks.” Blair’s mouth was dry, his lips cracked from being stretched open.

  Evan got up and went to the sink, finding a mug to fill with water and bring back to him. He helped Blair sit up and then held the mug for him to drink, when it was clear Blair’s hands were both still numb from being restrained. “Take it slow.”

  “Yeah. Thanks,” Blair repeated, between his efforts to swallow the water.

  Evan took a good look at him, keeping his face as calm and detached as he could. Karl had left some towels and a teal blue sweat suit on the bed. Sandburg’s jeans were damp where his bladder had emptied sometime in the twenty-four hours of his imprisonment. At least the jeans were baggy enough to get off past the ankle cuffs, and Evan helped him wiggle out of them, then handed him the damp wash cloth when the young man’s hands were steady enough to clean himself up.

  “Where are we?” Blair asked, not meeting his eyes.

  “I’m not sure exactly. They call it ‘the warehouse’.”

  “What do they want us for?”

  Evan took the cloth and rinsed it out, then brought it back. “They do live performances for the Internet. Charge a hefty fee for people to watch. They make videos, too.”

  “They killed those two men in the trailer. Shot them.” Blair’s hands faltered as he awkwardly wiped down his neck and chest.

  “I know.” Evan helped him into the sweatshirt. “I’ve been watching them closely over the past few weeks and they’re organized. Experienced.” He paused. “Are you a cop?”

  “No,” Sandburg said, shaking his head. “Not really. I work with a detective in Cascade. He’s my partner.”

  “Your partner?”

  “Yeah. I— I’m an observer. Grad student working on my doctorate.”

  “Oh.”

  “Sorry. I’m not much help.”

  They got the sweat pants up past the ankle cuffs, then Evan began a systematic look through the cupboards and drawers of the kitchenette, looking for anything that could be useful. Finally, he returned to the table, exhausted and sore.

  “Are you okay?” Blair looked up from where he sat hunched on the bed.

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “What did they do to you?” Blair slowly got to his feet and walked over to sit in the other chair.

  Evan shook his head. He really didn’t want to talk about it. His memories were vague, but disgusting. His skin felt diseased. Nausea threatened and he swallowed against the bile in his throat.

  “That guy said twenty minutes, so he’ll be back soon.” Blair reached out and grabbed Evan’s forearm that rested on the table. “Can I do anything to help you?”

  “No,” he said. “It’s too late. Someone bought me today. They’ll pick me up on Tuesday.” Evan could feel his chest clench, the panic clutching at him. Someone bought me. They sold me and someone bought me. I’m just a toy for some rich man to get his balls rocked. “Someone bought me,” he whispered again, but it didn’t sound any saner. He swore then, softly, the tremors passing through his body in waves.

  Evan was vaguely aware of an arm around his shoulder, a cup of hot, bitter coffee pressed into his hands. He laughed suddenly, hearing the hysteria behind it. Tears rolled down his face to drip into the black ceramic mug. “At least they have to go easy on me. I’m lucky. I’m damned lucky, you know? They can’t punch me or I’ll bruise, and they can’t cut me or do anything to me that will lessen my value. Because someone bought me. Someone fucking bought me!”

  He lost it then, only fleetingly aware of arms holding him, gently stroking his back as the sobs were wrenched from his body. He hadn’t let himself think about his future at all, but there was something about this young man’s empathy and gentleness that let him share his pain.

  Evan desperately needed someone to tell him that everything would be okay. He had to believe that. He had to believe that Nash would find him. That Harv would be there. That Cassidy — oh, God. That Cassidy would still care about him, despite what they had done to him.

  But Nash and Harvey and Cassidy weren’t here. Blair was. And despite not knowing anything about him, Blair Sandburg cared.

  It was the gentleness that helped the most, he realized later, when he had time to think about it. And it was the gentleness that gave him the strength to rein in his fear and anger. “Thanks,” he whispered, wiping his eyes on the arm of his sweatshirt. “I’ve got to talk to you quick before they come back. Listen, okay?”

  “Okay.” Blue eyes looked across at him intently, determined.

  “First, in case you get away. Tell Cassidy that I love
her. Tell Nash to take care of her. Tell Harv — that I’ll miss him.” Tears ran down his face but he had no time to deal with them. “Did you get that?”

  Blair repeated it back to him, understanding the urgency. He also repeated back the other information that Evan gave him, rough ideas of where they were, who had them and why, and then, the few precious details of what was happening to Evan on Tuesday.

  “What about you?” Evan asked finally, looking at Sandburg as footsteps approached the doorway. “Any messages?”

  Blair shook his head and smiled. “My partner knows how I feel about him. Thanks anyway, though.”

  *

  *

  Present

  12:00 midnight

  Bellevue

  Sandburg shivered violently, turning toward Ellison, wordlessly accepting the embrace offered.

  The memory fragments frightened him. He knew the memories were from the beginning of his captivity. He had been uninjured at that point. Nothing of what he had just remembered explained the bruises, the vicious aches and pains that almost took his breath away now. The pain inside his body.

  Someone had bought Evan.

  Had someone bought him? Had he been sold to someone? Had someone come and taken him, used him, and discarded him? He remembered the man in charge hadn’t wanted him ���

  Karl had, though. And someone named Pete. And maybe even the Scar Man.

  His body hurt. His stomach muscles were spasming. His lower back and legs and thighs were sore. He hurt inside.

  Had they ���

  Arms tightened around him, as desperate to give comfort as he was to receive it, and he added his own strength to the embrace, grabbing hold of the back of Ellison’s shirt.

  Don’t think about it. Not yet. Don’t imagine things that might have happened when you don’t remember. Don’t do it. Don’t panic. Don’t let it change you.

  “Jim?” he whispered, his face buried against his partner’s chest.

  “I’m here,” Ellison whispered back. “We’ll deal with whatever happened to you. I’m here. We’re together. I’m not going away.”

  The words were like manna to a starving man. “You’re damn right, you’re not going anywhere.”