The Beast And Me

by D. S. Wrights

  Instead, I got up slowly and stepped towards him.

  I bet he thought that I was about to give in, to capitulate, especially since he offered to bring me real food if I’d do it well.

  I didn’t.

  My voice was weak and throaty, when I told him that “I’m going to kill you. I will remember you, and I am going to kill you. Or maybe I will tell Ten to kill you while I watch you getting ripped apart. I will make Severin allow him to kill you for me.”

  After that the door was smashed shut and it was I who laughed. I laughed briefly though, since I realized that I had just admitted knowing Severin’s name. It was too late. I should’ve kept my mouth shut. But it was too late.

  Day 76

  When they came that night I fought. Like an animal. But that was the closest they would ever get me to be one.

  I love every bruise and every scratch of mine. They are my trophies. And I knew it, I was right. They weren’t allowed to do more than molest me in order to abase me. For me, however, there is no difference.

  Even though their flies stayed shut, until then...

  The guy I threatened the day before, he was about to break that rule. He told the others to pin me against the wall, my back facing him, while they told him that they weren’t allowed to do this. Still, they were following his order, like saying that this wasn’t okay would take the guilt off of them.

  “The rule was not to fuck her”, I can still hear these words, and they won’t stop repeating themselves in my head with his voice, and I still feel his hands sliding down my tailbone and further down, between the cheeks...

  “STOP!” someone yelled through the open door.

  My muscles were cramping, still trying to obey me and evade him, though there was no way out. Despite that yell his fingers stayed where they were and I sensed the damp warmth of them against my cold body.

  I couldn’t tell whose voice it was, but after a moment of hesitation, the men who had held me against the wall let me go, retreated, just a moment before that guy who I’m going to kill, followed them. They left and the door was slammed shut. What followed was silence. There is nothing worse than silence. And I was buried with it.

  Anger kept and keeps me from crying. Wrath kept me from collapsing and still does. The thirst for revenge was what did the most terrible things to me. It burned and blazed inside of me, eating away the hunger and thirst my body sensed. It has rebuilt me from the inside.

  White is in for extreme measures.

  Mine have to be more extreme.

  I cannot let him win, and if that means the only thing I can do is not let him break me, then I won’t. I know that open rebellion will only make it worse, but I want to keep my self-respect at all costs. Yet, this might mean that I will never get out of here.

  So, what am I willing to sacrifice?

  I knew that they wouldn’t take me back to my room the next day, well, I expected it. And I felt like starving. I tried to distract myself with working out, but I was too weak for pushups or anything.

  Then I remembered the Yoga and Tai Chi figures and it helped, doing it over and over again calmed me down, helped me focus and even made me forget about painting out my plans for revenge and escape, and thinking of touching Jay, being close to him, being intimate with him, knowing that this abomination of a human would watch us and still never get me.

  My mind was empty as long as I managed to keep up the movements. Yet, with an empty stomach, and freezing because of being naked, it was hard to continue, and my thoughts went back to vengeance. I wanted it and it was the only food I got. They need to suffer more than I did. I erased every doubt, about if I would see Jay again, the second it appeared in my mind. I will do everything to see him again, because I need him, and he needs me. We keep each other sane. We are saving each other. I will do everything to get the both of us out of here, and I don’t care if he’s dangerous. He’s not when he’s with me.

  And there I wrote it down, but do I really mean it? Am I willing to do everything for my freedom? Even lose myself and loathe myself?

  I was ready to fight tonight. But it was today that the door was opened and White stood there, wearing his white clothes. The way he looked at me... I just ignored the bile’s fluid that tried to crawl up my throat, I swallowed it down. Severin’s face showed me perfectly what I had to do. There it was again, the question of what I was willing to do, in form of an invisible wall between him and me. I could stay myself and stand there, disobedient, pretend to be too weak to walk, but show that he hadn’t broken me. Or I could deceive him, and play the role he wanted me to, delude him into believing that he had won. I made a choice, I just don’t know if I can live with it.

  Closing my eyes, pressing them shut, I ran up to him and tossed myself into his arms. Using all the energy I had left in me to pretend that he was someone else, not Jay, my Dad. Hell, no I didn’t hug him, I couldn’t right then, but I pressed myself against him, digging my hands into his shirt. Telling myself, that I just wanted to steal his warmth, and that I just wanted to make him feel that I was his remorseful, scared and broken little girl that promised to be good. Maybe I would have puked as I felt his hands on my back after a moment of hesitation, but there was nothing in my stomach to puke out. I called upon the image of my father, pictured every detail of the last time I saw him, as he waved goodbye, and when I decided that I would need another hug.

  I don’t know how I managed to hold on to that illusion, and it worked, pretending that this man I loathed, despised, and wanted to strangle was in fact my Dad, who had come to take me home. My face was covered in tears, my body was shaking, and my knees gave in, while I murmured words I didn’t even comprehend.

  White took off his coat and wrapped it around me along with his arm as he walked me back, caringly, and I held down my head, used my hair as a veil between him and them so that I could keep up the act, even though I wasn’t really acting. His behavior, though, his low voice speaking softly to me, saying that everything would be okay now, helped a lot.

  I made sure to glare at the guy whose days were about to come to an end. And he flinched.

  Day 77

  I’m still tired and edgy and I couldn’t stand the look on Peter’s face as he brought me Breakfast. Worry.

  I think that’s what I saw, but I’m not sure. I don’t know if I even care, let alone trust him or his expression. He will not help me. Can I be sure about that?

  I’m too quick to decide what I know and what I don’t know. Some things are clear as a bell: that there is a chance that White planned all of this, even the humiliation going that far. I don’t put that past him. Everything he has done and everything I know about him, just points at the possibility of it.

  Peter, however, is still unclear to me. There is a facet of him lying in the dark, a shadow, something that is important. From the memory of the moments we have shared I can tell that he feels something for me, but I don’t know if it tends into the direction what I believe Jay to feel for me, or what White feels for me. In the end it’s not important, because my heart belongs to one, my hate to another. Still, the question remains if he would help me. I think he would, I’m just not sure what I have to do for it.

  All White achieved was that I miss Jay even more, and that I hate this SOB increasingly. Or did he aim for that? I’m not sure again, but I believe that he wants me to go full Stockholm syndrome on him and side with him: my dungeon master. I think I have to make him believe that. For now I did, but still it feels like making a deal with the Devil. Yet the Devil seems more sympathetic than White.

  I’m not able to sleep, and I wasn’t able to sleep last night. Not even after Severin plucked me into bed.

  So the first thing was checking the vent, while I went to the toilet. It’s not shut tight, but I can’t tell if they have checked it. I missed this bathroom. It’s so clean, has a door and a shower. I went right in, heating myself up. There was no way that I would clean myself while White was there with me, so I had just dug into my p
hysical weakness that he would never have the idea to make me shower. Thank god I don’t have a bathtub, because he probably would have wanted to wash me. There is no word in my vocabulary to describe my distaste of that idea.

  I kept wondering if they would suspect me if I went through it now to get some tools, or if they would believe that I’m too shocked, too shaken and too weak, that I am incapable of it. Why I didn’t believe it myself, I can’t tell.

  Every time I loosen that vent it gets harder to put it back, so it seems, at least just with my fingers. And this time they were shaking that heavily that I almost dropped one screw into the sink. Still, it didn’t keep me from continuing, but I wasn’t able to pull myself up. The only person who’s able to defeat me is me, and that night I was really good at it.

  And today, well I won’t try anything today; all I do is catch up on sleep and eat. Apparently that’s fine with everyone, especially me.

  Day 78

  I only sleep and eat and they leave me in peace. Still I wake up now and then to sit up straight in bed. Whom am I kidding? There’s no way I’ll get over this quickly.

  My sleep is messed up, just as I am. Because while dreaming I am always thinking, just for a moment, that I am still in the cell. Until I realize that I am covered with blankets, wearing clothes and I have my flashlight beneath my pillow. As always.

  It doesn’t take long for me to fall asleep again, because I am so exhausted, so tired, and I am grateful, because I slip back into sleep before the memories barge in on me. There are the dreams of course and in these dreams I’m still helpless, still not capable to defend myself. I have to change that. I will change that. I will get out of here and leave every cruel memory behind.

  And then I start to dream about Jay, my Jay.

  Day 79

  I woke up in the middle of the night, but that doesn’t surprise me, honestly. So, being wide awake, I decided to go for a stroll. Those three days are still wearing down on me, but having eaten three decent meals and countless hours of sleep made me feel strong enough to give it a try. I hadn’t planned on going far anyways.

  I crawled my way down to the supply room and of course the grate was stuck. I don’t know how I am supposed to open it without any tools. The screw heads are on the other side and I can’t do anything with my fingers.

  I need a nipper or a screw-wrench, so that I can hold the grate with one hand and unscrew with the other.

  Where do I get a nipper from? There’s no way I can open that without anything from this side. I could only kick against it and make an alarming noise and even if I manage to get into that room and back up again, how will I close that thing without anyone noticing that I got in?

  I’ve never been the girl using others for her own advantage, but I think I have to, and I think I have to go to the fullest. I don’t know if I can, but haven’t I have made the decision already?

  I asked Peter if he wanted to eat Lunch with me. If it was okay, because I couldn’t stand being alone.

  I think it was logical to say, something believable. When he brought me to the gym, I tried to move closer to him, just a little, so that I would accidentally touch him. I’m not doing a bad thing. This isn’t Paradise, this isn’t even normal Earth, this is Hell and Peter knows exactly where he is. His actions have caused me suffering. He cannot be as naïve as I was when I came here. He can’t be. I know I sound like I have to justify myself, and I do. I’m about to become as cold and relentless as them, and I never wanted to.

  Something unexpected happened at Lunch.

  White brought me my food instead of Peter and I did my very best to force a shy smile on my lips. He had wanted to show me that he was the master, and that I was whatever he wanted me to be.

  I tried to remind myself of that and not take the fork and ram it into his neck. I would love it to be covered in his blood. It would have been easy, the chances that he would bleed out quickly and die weren’t auspicious, but it also would decrease my chances for escape to a minimum.

  Nonetheless picturing me do it and exploiting the image of my theoretical action’s result gave me the calmness I needed right then.

  I played the nice and shy girl I had been before he had taken me. Pretending to be my old self was harder than I thought though. These eleven weeks have changed me irretrievably. Something in his look adds to my belief that he is jealous of Jay.

  I cannot say why. It’s just a feeling, an experience of watching his behavior.

  “I heard you would like some company”, White said and Peter brought his food, not looking at me, and it stung, but instead of sadness there was nothing but anger inside of me. “So I thought that I would join you today.”

  He didn’t continue so I figured that he wanted me to answer. I didn’t look up, since I didn’t want him to see the disgust and hatred in my eyes. Instead, I wanted him to think that I was scared, meek and the little girl he wanted me to be. Though I knew deep down inside he just begged for me to do something so that he could punish me again. And it was this thought that gave me the strength to act like I did, to pretend to be a scared little bunny facing a giant snake. I wouldn’t give him any reason to punish me.

  “That, ” I added a pause on purpose, keeping my eyes glued to my tray “is very kind of you.”

  So we ate and he asked me stupid things. About if I liked my books, especially the new ones, my paintings, my room. As if I’d appreciate it now, as if I was grateful for his hospitality. I gave shy, low and brief answers and nodded, avoiding looking at him directly. I think I nailed it.

  And then he asked me what Yoga postures I was able to do. I simply got up to show him, evidently without thinking twice about it. After putting that mat in a direction where he could perfectly see me, I pulled off my shirt, not looking at him and started doing some of those figures.

  “Very good”, he approved and nothing else, trying to sound fatherly or something like that, I couldn’t care less if he was proud of me.

  I only thought of making the right performance for my own benefit. I know he likes to watch, maybe he loves watching even more than everything else.

  I guess that this is something I can make work for me. I hope it does, honestly, because I don’t want to pull the ‘punish-me’-card. That one is the last resort.

  Of course I wasn’t taken to Jay after that visit, so I asked Peter for a walk after Dinner and he agreed hesitantly. Maybe he sensed that there was something off about me, maybe he himself has trouble trusting. I won’t think about him, I shouldn’t care about anyone’s feelings, but mine, and Jay’s. I hope he’s okay, I hope he’s not worried sick.

  There was no Gray, so I was lucky, I guess. I moved closer to Peter again. I need him to show that he cares, even if he doesn’t, that he has an effect on me, and I won’t deny that he has, because I can’t figure him out.

  To make myself act correctly, I thought about the fact that outside of these walls I was officially dead. My parents had buried me. For some time I had managed to ignore this fact, but as I thought of it again, I didn’t need to act trembling. Instantly, Peter asked if we should go back and I shook my head.

  “I can’t stand to be watched, it feels like they are touching me”, I said and he moved away. “I don’t want them to use me. I just want... to be safe.”

  That wasn’t a lie, and I said it, when we passed that storage room, hoping that he would maybe act on my indication. Peter took my hand and squeezed it gently, nothing more. This room would have given us some privacy and me the chance to take something. But let’s be honest, I hadn’t expected it to be that easy. It will take time. I don’t know if I have enough patience.

  Day 80

  I don’t want to become like them. I don’t want to become a cruel, vicious person that cares only for oneself. But I know if I don’t, I won’t get out of here. I’m not sure if I even have a chance to, but I will have to try. If I don’t try, I will eventually break, and I will not only lose the person I once was, I would undo myself. I cannot let tha
t happen.

  And I guess that I only have one shot at it. I keep asking myself what might happen if I fail, and how they will punish me. Now knowing what happens if I even act rebellious. What will they do to me when I fail to escape? The only value I have for them is how he values me, Jay. I don’t want to use him. I will never use him. He’s the only one that doesn’t deserve it. He is the only one. The others don’t care, so I shouldn’t care. I shouldn’t care about Peter.

  God, I miss Jay. It’s been a week, but it feels so much longer. After what has happened, not having him near is even more painful. If they don’t bring me back to him, I will have to break my silent promise.

  Now I know how they do it, those chicks who get whatever they want, whenever they want. I doubt they have their own personality, they just become that what the other one desires, so they get whatever they are aiming for. Not that this makes any sense in my eyes. I touched him accidentally, I smiled shyly, I even blushed because of shame, but of course he didn’t know that. I think it worked. He smiled back in the same way. It makes me feel sick and bad, most definitely unfair. It has upset me already; how far am I even able to go.

  I miss Jay so much and I’m so worried. I’ve trained so hard today that I know I will be sore. I worked out until my muscles ached and went further until I had no strength left. I don’t know for how long I sat in the shower. That was when I realized that I’ve been here for more than two and a half months. Eighty days.

  I need someone to hold me to give me strength. I don’t know if I can make it. It’s like I had managed to lie to myself the whole time, to believe that this is a weird dream, but I know it’s not. I know it’s real. And I know there is no line for them that they won’t cross. I know that I will end up doing things I have never imagined possible, things I have never even thought of thinking about. I need Jay. I need him so much more than just to survive. I need him to stay alive.