“I think we’ve been out here long enough for one day,” he said.
I smiled and took one last look at the bridge, trying to memorize as many details as possible. I knew I was going to be wracking my brain, in the days to come, over this little puzzle.
He grasped my hand, led me inside, and continued up the stairs.
My stomach knotted with dread. I knew what it meant when he led me to the bedroom by the hand.
And Heaven help me if I try to refuse.
It would go much easier for me, and be done with so much more quickly, if I just slapped a smile on my face and let it happen.
Ugh, ugh, ugh…
Chapter Two
“My Mia”
It’s summer, and I’m standing in the small kitchen of my grandparent’s vacation home. My mom, two aunts, and grandmother are tripping over each other as they prepare breakfast for the combined families. Outside, the marina is awaking to a lazy Sunday morning. I can hear my younger cousins running around with a total disregard for their noise level.
Now I’m at the end of the marina’s pier, lying on the floating dock, riding the waves in their constant cycle of up and down, up and down. The wave height indicating that a storm is moving in. The creaking of the wood bemoaned its struggles to remain stable against the current.
Now I’m standing on the porch at the end of the trailer. The air is fresh after the recent rain shower. I’m looking at the sight of a rainbow spanning past the old railroad bridge that stands downriver. A blue heron captures my attention as it returns to its nest on the uninhabited island that sits out in the middle of the river, directly across from where I’m standing…
BEEP, BEEP, BEEP, BEEP, BEEP.
Asshole’s alarm went off, waking us both and tearing me from my dream.
He reached up and turned the alarm app on his phone off. Then, as usual, he rolled over and kissed me good morning with his nasty morning breath. And I’m left to be glad that at least it was a simple, quick peck this time. “Good morning, Amelia.”
That’s what he freaking called me, Amelia.
“Good morning,” I responded.
He rolled back over, got up, and headed for the bathroom to get ready for work.
I shifted to stare at the ceiling when I heard him turn the shower on.
Amelia’s not even close to being my name. How long has it actually been, since I last heard someone say my real name? I wonder if my head would still turn at the sound of it. Is it possible to forget what your name really is, if no one ever used it? How long would that take?
How long would it be before I began to forget how my life used to be, how safe and loved I used to feel? At what point do I begin to believe in the same delusions that I’ve been feeding him, that I’m happy here, that I’d stay put even if he turned off all the cameras and alarms?
How long would it take before I gave up the battle and lost everything that made me, me?
I got up, put on my robe, and went downstairs to prepare breakfast and pack his lunch for his first day on the new job.
If he was packing that day, he always wanted a lunchmeat and cheese sandwich, a piece of fruit, and a bottle of water. He never accepted any leftovers or anything that had to be heated up. Twice a week he would eat out somewhere, and I was to be grateful for it because it meant that I didn’t have to pack him a lunch on those days.
I had everything ready, and was standing by the windowed wall, when he came down the stairs.
“What has you so enthralled?” he asked.
“Look out there,” I said and gestured toward the river. “The water is shrouded with fog. It’s eerie, yet beautiful at the same time.”
He grinned, “I think you’re going to be happy here.”
I forced a sigh of contentment, “I think so, too. This is truly the house of my dreams.” I laced my tone with faked sincerity, “I don’t think I could ask for anything more.” Except my freedom.
We sat down to eat a breakfast of fresh-cut fruit and coffee.
“I’m sorry breakfast isn’t something more substantial. I’m afraid I spent most of the time exploring the kitchen, trying to familiarize myself with where everything has been placed.”
“The movers unpacked and set everything up for us. Feel free to rearrange things as you see fit.”
“And the two extra bedrooms upstairs?”
“One is simply an extra room, for now. The other I’m using as my office.”
“All right, thank you.”
“This is our home. Ours. I’ve noticed you’ve been walking on eggshells at times, trying to please me. I want you to be comfortable here. Feel free to make your mark, so to speak. If you need anything, just make a list and I’ll pick it up.”
I was… stunned. Though I knew that he’d be watching every move I made, giving me just enough leash to either handle the little freedom he gave me, or prove myself unworthy. Test or not, it was going to feel strange to be allowed to decide something on my own. “May I choose the paint colors?”
“Do you even know how to paint?”
I nodded. “I helped paint a friend’s house once. I did pretty well with the task.”
In actuality, I’d spent three summers painting houses. My dad had wanted me to get a summer job when I’d turned fourteen. He had a buddy who ran a small painting business, who also knew that I was a hard worker and would deal with minimum wage.
He nodded as he thought it over. “You don’t like all the white? I thought it helped brighten the place up.”
I reached over and put my hand on his. “I do enjoy how bright it is in here. I love how light and airy it feels, but… every room? It looks so sterile. And sterile can be good… but every room?”
He wiped his mouth with a napkin. “I’ll stop by a home improvement store and pick up a pack of paint samples. Pick out a few colors that you like for each room and we’ll make the final decisions together.”
“Could I maybe start with something small, like a closet, and use it for practice?”
“That sounds like a good idea. Give it some thought and let me know where you’d like to begin. In the meantime, I’ll get those paint samples.”
I gave him a rueful smile, “Coursework and allowing me to redecorate… If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were trying to keep me busy.”
He smiled with chagrin, “Guilty. It hasn’t escaped my attention that you are less irritable when you’re kept busy. When you spend your day sitting in a chair, staring at nothing, you take issue with every little thing I do when I get home.”
…See? It was comments like the one that had just come out of his mouth that had convinced me that I was under surveillance in the first place. He never came right out and admitted it, but he alluded to it often enough.
“I don’t think I’ve ever realized that about myself.” Maybe it was because I’d spent those days stewing over my plight. By the time he’d gotten home, I was good and marinated in my righteous indignation. Of course, those were days that were always followed by horrible evenings. My poor attitude never went unpunished.
I’d begun cleaning his house and puttering around in the kitchen to pass the time, waiting for a rescue or an ingenious escape plan to hit me. Neither one had happened yet, but I’d noticed he was easier to deal with when he wasn’t focused on hitting me with one thing or another. I thought it was my cooking and cleaning that had triggered the change in how we interacted. Here, the key had been in me finding something to do with my anxious energy.
“It’s time for me to head out. I should be home between five-thirty and six.” He picked up his briefcase and stood to leave.
I followed him to the door and kissed him goodbye. “Have a good first day on the job.”
“Have a good day yourself, my Mia,” he said.
‘My Mia.’ ‘My Mia.’ My name isn’t Mia, or Amelia, Asshole. And I’m not ‘your’ anything, you pig.
He reached up, used his body to block my view, and punched a code into the alarm
panel so he could open the door and leave. If this alarm system was the same as the previous one, it would reset in ten seconds. And I knew - from watching out of the peephole in the door of the other house - that he’d linger outside the closed door for those ten seconds, just to make sure that I didn’t make a run for it.
I was careful to keep my expression serene, knowing that the area just inside the door was sure to be covered by a camera. Just in case I up and decided to try and figure the code out again.
I’d tried, without success, to figure out his code over the first few months that I had been allowed on the main floor in the previous house. I’d figured out that he had different codes for different commands. So no one code was entered repeatedly to make marks or wear away the numbers on the panel. If I had to guess, either he had each door or window responding to a different code, or maybe he had it set up to respond to a number of codes. For all I knew, the panel might just be for show and there was something reading heat signatures or fingerprints instead. All that I was sure of was that his alarm system was beyond my level of technological knowledge.
I kept a dreamy little look on my face as I began to walk around the downstairs of the house, touching the furniture and appliances in appreciation. I gave every appearance to be contemplating furniture placement as I looked around for evidence of a phone, or internet, or any means of communicating with the outside world. I’d peeked behind furniture, under the pretense of locating the electrical outlets. I’d even shifted the couch in the great room, and stood back to contemplate the change, for good measure.
Nope, there was nothing. There weren’t even any marks, let alone solid faceplates, on the walls to indicate where any of those things had once been.
Asshole always used either his cell phone or his laptop. Both of which he either kept on his person, or locked away from me. Any telecommunications entering this house must only be hooked up to his office. Damn. I was hoping evidence of the previous owners would still be around. He must have had it all removed and the holes in the wall patched. Double damn.
Now I was paused, leaning against the railing next to the top of the stairs, looking down at the great room below. I was pretending to imagine various furniture placements, waving my finger around as though that was helping me to picture things in my mind.
I looked up and out, through the windows, and caught a glimpse of the far end of the bridge. That bridge had haunted me all throughout the day yesterday. And then it kept flashing through my head as I was trying to fall asleep. I thought about my grandparent’s summer home again. There was a railroad bridge downriver, and a traffic bridge upriver. That traffic bridge was similar to this one. But this one was wider, the traffic moved faster, and more big-rigs rumbled along it. I knew that a lot of bridges could look pretty much the same but, damn it all to hell, I freaking knew that bridge.
My gaze resettled on the mist rising from the water. There had been a noticeable chill in the house last night, but I wasn’t sure if that was a clue as to what month it was. I was kept so out of touch with reality that I was to the point of taking a general guess as to what season it was. Up until yesterday, I’d only seen sunlight filtering though high windows covered with sheer curtains, stolen glances through a briefly opened front door, and peering through a peephole. No television, no radio, no contact with other humans. I’d felt like I was in a permanent state of limbo, or more like purgatory.
I looked out of the front windows to get a look at the surrounding foliage. Lots of evergreens shielded the view beyond the woods. And the deciduous growth was missing their leaves. There had been a chill in the air yesterday, yet it hadn’t been decidedly cold during the daylight. Was it late fall or early spring? Maybe the area was experiencing a very mild winter. Maybe he’d just driven me so far south that this was winter here. Was there snow on the ground back home? There had been some on the ground from where we had been living - I remember the crunch under my feet as he guided me from the door to the trunk.
I’d thought about trying to notate the passage of time in some way, like they do in the movies. But I couldn’t see how making some sort of mark for each passing day in some spot on a wall was going to help me get out. Maybe it was just a little coping mechanism, like if you could still identify the date, then the rest of the world still existed in some context. Maybe it was a last foothold on control. I figured it wouldn’t help me to know when the holidays or birthdays passed me by. It only would have made me feel worse to realize I wasn’t there, with the family, to celebrate. Something like that would only have served to torture me further, one more thing to add to the ever-growing list of things I had missed. Besides, it’s not like I could have kept track of the days while in a basement without windows, or any other way, to tell the difference between night and day.
No matter what season it was, I’d seen enough clues to tell me that I was now missing my senior year of high school. Just knowing that was bad enough, thank you. Senior year wasn’t something I could ever get back, not when all of my friends would be moving on come June.
I shook myself out of my reverie and set about cleaning and tidying the house. It irritated me that the third bedroom was locked. He might feel that he could trust me enough to let me walk out onto the porch under his supervision, but obviously not enough to let me see his lair. He could call it an office all he wanted to, but I had deemed it a lair. It’s where he was going to continue doing all of his plotting and planning.
The second bedroom bothered me, too. He’d said it was extra for now. What was that supposed to mean? He’d given me an area in the home that was out in the open, instead of a room to study in. So do I take that to mean that he thought I would enjoy having the view, or that he didn’t trust me to have a room to myself? Maybe he had future plans for the room.
To me, that empty room was a threat, plain and simple. If there were no basement here, then that was a room he might turn into a place of punishment for me.
I shuddered at the possibility.
This house was a far cry from that basement room he’d originally tucked me away in. There was no sunlight, no source of fresh air. I’d felt like a caged animal. Eventually he’d let me have access to the rest of his basement. I’d honestly thought that was all I could ever hope for. I’d sat for days, staring at the cinder block walls, with scenes from The Shawshank Redemption playing in my mind as I dreamed of tunneling my way out. But I hadn’t had any tools with which to begin cracking though the walls, or a poster to cover the hole with.
Then the day had come that he had let me go upstairs. He took the time to lay out careful expectations that if I was to remain upstairs, I’d now act as his stay-at-home wife. A wife who never left the house, was constantly being watched, and hadn’t any right to say ‘no’ to anything.
In the beginning of that new period of captivity, I’d taken a chair around that house, using it to climb up to dust corners and the tops of shelves, and to pull aside the sheers and clean the windows. From what I could tell from the limited views, it was a sparse neighborhood, with nearly identical little bungalows. Completely nondescript in every way. The only useful piece of information I’d gained was in finding small cameras placed in a few corners of that house.
The threat of the basement, and now that empty room, was why I had learned to play along with his intended role for me. I was never going to chance giving him a reason to toss me in another dark, dank place. Mentally, I didn’t think I could handle another round of that. I know I keep talking tough in my thoughts, hurling imaginary insults. But, truth be told, I’m playing as much a game of manipulation with myself as I am with him. I force myself to believe that I’m slowly gaining the upper hand, that I’m lulling him into a false sense of security. But in quiet moments like this, I wondered if I wasn’t just fooling myself into believing that I’d make it out of here with my spunky sanity intact.
Chapter Three
Revelation
Weeks had gone by and I hadn’t managed to paint anything. I
think he was nervous about what I might do with tools at my disposal. I really couldn’t blame him for being suspicious. I’d had a fantasy or two about cracking his skull open with a hammer. Or stabbing him in the eye with a screwdriver and giving it a good twist. Or accidentally splashing paint thinner in his eyes and kicking him down the flight of stairs as he starts groping his way to a sink.
He’d only just begun to allow himself to walk down the stairs ahead of me. The first few weeks we were here, and the whole time we lived in the last house, he always made sure he was on a higher step than I. Such paranoia coming from a bullying monster was almost funny. But trust me, if I was sure he’d be knocked unconscious long enough for me to get outside and find help, I’d have pushed his ass down the stairs the first chance he’d given me.
It would be my luck that he’d break an arm or get a mild concussion, nothing that would stop him from grabbing a hold of me and doling out some sort of punishment before seeking medical help. Losing what little trust I had gained from him was not worth the risk of trying some half-assed escape attempt. It’s a lesson I’ve learned well.
But, if nothing else, his paranoia is a constant reminder that he is a human. He’s not really a monster, he’s only human. He may be smarter than me, and stronger than me, but I do have the ability to surpass him in two other areas if I just stick with it: patience and determination. He was human, he wasn’t perfect, and he would screw up. I just had to be ready to take advantage of it when the time came.
I had kept myself busy by organizing the kitchen and pantry, and then the master bedroom closet. Then I reorganized all of the curriculum materials in my little classroom area. I’d also rearranged the great room in half a dozen different ways. I did anything I could think of to show him that I was settling in to stay.
He hadn’t taken me back out onto the porch again and I hadn’t asked, well not technically. We had gotten some snow once, and I asked him to go out onto the porch and gather a big bowl full of clean snow for me. He’d raised his eyebrow, but had indulged me. I’d then used the snow to make ice cream for dessert that night. I tried not to seem disappointed that he hadn’t told me that I could go out with him.
Lulling the Kidnapper Page 3
