Happy Ever After - Volume 1: A Novel of Horror and Suspense

by Matt Shaw

  I take another step. There’s another ‘creak’ but now there are only nine more steps to go. I can do this. I have to do this. Thoughts of my mum and dad flash through my mind. Not now. I don’t need the distractions. Concentrate.

  Another step is conquered. I’m starting to worry that I can’t hear him in the bathroom now. I keep expecting to hear him shout at me from the doorway. Part of me wants to give in and skip down the stairs, shouting to him that ‘I’m getting myself a glass of water and does he want anything?’ Don’t do it. Don’t give in. Another step and there’s only seven left, seven stairs, a short run, a front door and then freedom. Mum and dad.

  What is he doing in the bathroom? How much time do I have?

  I take another step, and another one, and another one, I’m getting quicker now ignoring the stairs calling out to the homeowner – warning him of my attempted escape.

  “Vanessa?” his voice calls from the bathroom, “is that you?” He heard me. Fuck. Stay calm. Stay quiet. Quiet as a mouse.

  Just take another step and then jump the remaining ones. You’ll be louder but at least you’ll be close to the front door. What if it’s locked? Don’t think about that now. Worry about it later. I can’t help but worry about it. What if the front door is locked? Stay calm. I can run through to the back door – it might not be locked. He might have left it open.

  Concentrate on the task at hand.

  “Vanessa?” he calls again. It doesn’t sound like he is in the bath.

  Fuck.

  I take my last step before jumping the remaining few. I land with a bump that he couldn’t have failed to hear. But it doesn’t matter. I don’t care if he does hear it. This is it. I’m nearly there. The front door is only a few feet away from me now.

  “What are you doing?”

  I spin around, terror on my face as I see him stood at the top of the stairs looking at me with a look of bemusement on his face, “What are you doing?” he repeats.

  Fuck him. Don’t answer. Just go. This is your chance. I spin around and run towards the front door and pull on the handle and it doesn’t budge.

  Locked.

  Fuck.

  I can hear him close behind me as he thunders down the stairs. I turn around to face him; perhaps I can still make a run for the back door. Perhaps it may not be locked..

  Consequences

  Her eye has bruised from the impact of my fist. That happened more or less straight away. Perhaps I hit her too hard? I didn’t mean to but I couldn’t help myself. I press a cold piece of meat against the bruise to try and take the swelling down. It’s funny but whenever you are hurt or feeling low – you always turn to your mother and here I am, with a piece of her mother trying to take away Vanessa’s pain.

  She moans as I press it firmly against her skin. She’s coming too. Good. I have some questions for her.

  “What...?” she whispers as her brain tries to make sense of what happened.

  “Ssh.” I tell her, not because everything’s okay now and that I have her but because I don’t want to hear her voice just yet. I’m on the edge at the moment and I’m worried she’s going to take me to a place I’ll struggle to come back from.

  “I’m sorry,” she continues.

  I believe her. She is sorry. Sorry that she was discovered. Has she been playing me all along? I’m confused. I don’t know where I stand. We had sex. She must love me. Women don’t do that.

  “I’m sorry,” she says again, “I’m sorry.” I think I did hit her too hard. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry...” I think I broke her.

  “Ssh.” I stroke her hair. “I’m sorry.” Shut the fuck up. “I’m sorry.”

  “Ssh,” I try and calm her again. Her good eye weeps a single tear. I wonder whether it’s a tear of sorrow or frustration from being so close and yet so far from escape.

  “Please believe me, I’m sorry...”

  I can’t help but feel sorry for her. I don’t pretend to know what she is going through but I know part of it must be hard. I just thought that our love would be strong enough to pull her through it.

  “I’m sorry,” she’s crying now.

  It doesn’t matter that I do feel sorry for her, or do believe that she’s sorry for the right reasons. She tried to escape and she has this coming.

  “I’m sorry.”

  I take her by the wrist and drag her from the bed, in the spare bedroom where I put her whilst she slept. She lands on the floor with a bump and lets out a small moan of pain. She doesn’t know pain yet. But she will.

  She’s louder now, “I’m sorry. Peter, I’m sorry.”

  Don’t listen to her. Teach her the lesson that needs to be taught.

  I pull her through the spare bedroom’s doorway and let her go. She tries to get up but my foot on her shoulder stops her in her tracks.

  “Please, Peter, I’m sorry.”

  “I’ve tried to be nice to you. I’ve tried to love you. I do love you.”

  “I love you too. I just miss my mum and dad. I’m sorry.”

  Stop saying you are sorry. You have this coming. You need this. We need to go through this to progress – as a couple.

  “LISTEN TO ME!” The anger is coming now. I want to stop it but I can’t, I’ll see this through to the conclusion and hope that she is able to see it through to the recovery. I beg myself not to take it too far. Deep down I don’t want it to go too far. On the surface though, there is no limit to where this will go. I can’t control the surface.

  “Listen to me,” I repeat quieter but with a definite authority in my voice, “I love you. Why can’t you love me?”

  “I do love you.” Tears continue to flow.

  “Why did you have to try and run from me? Why do you want to run? I’ve provided everything you could wish for.”

  “I don’t want to run from you. I just wanted to see my mum and dad. I was going to come back. I don’t want it to just be the two of us forever. I want you to meet my parents.”

  “Your parents are dead!” I didn’t mean to say that. She’ll never forgive me if she learns the truth. Control the temper.

  “My foster parents.”

  She thinks I meant the foster parents. Thank God. The temper still controls me though. Don’t explain what you meant to her. Don’t tell her that her foster parents are also dead.

  “I wanted you to meet my foster parents. I want a boyfriend that I can show off to people. One that I can be proud to be seen with,” she continues.

  “And I want a girlfriend that doesn’t run. I want a girlfriend that loves me. I want a girlfriend that I can trust.” I’m halfway between shouting and talking. Control yourself, Peter.

  “I won’t run. I promise. I was just homesick.”

  “You’re right. You won’t run.”

  I take hold of her barefoot and put it in the doorway, she’s still crying. Her crying is about to turn to screaming. A smile sneaks onto my face. A sadistic smile that I can’t control.

  “Please – what are you doing?”

  “I don’t want a girlfriend that’ll run.” I slam the door shut on her ankle and she lets out an ear-piercing scream that echoes through the empty house. An instant bruise swells across her already-tender ankle.

  I offer no sympathy. Instead I pick her up and take her through the doorway back into the spare room where I drop her on the bed. She’s crying hard and whimpering how much it hurts but I don’t care. If I feel anything, it’s anger towards her. She made me do this. Not me.

  I take her wrists and cuff them to the headboard before moving down the bed and slamming the other cuffs around her ankles – causing another scream. For a moment she struggles until she realises, within seconds, that she’s not going anywhere.

  I hope she can forgive me. I hope I can forgive her.

  Unconditional Love

  I love her so much.

  I didn’t want to hurt her but I believe I wasn’t left with an option. I need to be able to trust her. I need to know she loves me too. She said she do
es love me but just needed to see her mum and dad. I want to believe her.

  I think I feel guilt in the pit of my stomach as I watch her on the monitor. She is asleep now but it took a good few hours for her to get to sleep. I want to wake her and apologise. I want to wake her to see if she forgives me. I want, even more, to wake her and see if she apologises to me.

  Let her sleep. I can talk to her later. I’m at a loss as to what to do now, though, I don’t like it when she sleeps or when things aren’t working between us. I find myself at a loss. I can’t believe how the day has changed so much.

  “I’m sorry,” I mutter quietly to myself. It doesn’t matter that she tries to run from me. Whenever she does anything wrong – it doesn’t matter, once I’m calmed down from the initial shock of discovering the wrongdoing. She could do anything – I’d still love her.

  I wonder whether it would calm her down if I did let her see her mum and dad. In the long run – would she thank me? Perhaps the knowledge that they aren’t sat at home worrying about her whereabouts would make her feel better about our current situation. Don’t even think about it.

  She won’t thank you.

  She’d thank you even less when she realises you’ve been cutting bits from her dearly departed mother; her mother that smelt faintly of Tuna and tasted like beef.

  That was strange. Young Susie tasted like chicken. I look to the monitor and forget my concern as I can’t help but wonder what Vanessa tastes like. Don’t go there. Don’t make things worse. They are bad enough already. I’m in control of the temper now. Had I not been in control I would have satisfied my curiosity and taken things too far to bring back. I keep telling myself – keep control.

  She’s awake now. She hasn’t been awake for more than a minute before she starts to cry again. Let her cry. There’s nothing I can do for her. The pain will go, in time. It’s not a bad thing if the pain doesn’t go quickly. At least she won’t try and run again.

  “Peter,” she cries out for me. She probably wants to beg me for painkillers. I’d want to give them to her, if that’s what she wants, but I also want her to learn from it. Would giving her painkillers teach her anything? Or would it just show her I’m a pushover.

  It’s not just my temper I need to keep control of. I need to keep control of her.

  “Peter, please I know you are there. Please, listen to me, I’m sorry,” she continues, looking directly at the monitor: directly at me.

  I won’t go in. I’ll listen from here.

  “I do love you. I promise I love you. Keep me chained up if you want, I’ll understand if that’s what you want. I was just missing my mum and dad. I want you to meet them. I want them to meet you, my boyfriend.”

  She’s lying. Is she?

  “I don’t want to run from you. I thought we had something special growing between us.”

  I thought we had something special growing between us. She ruined it.

  “I know I ruined that but, please, let me fix it. Let me prove how much I love you. I still want to sleep in the same room as you. I want us to be able to cuddle up together. I want us to be able to play games together. Share stories, jokes and just chat together. I want us to be a proper couple.”

  That’s all I’ve ever wanted from the first day I knew ‘love’ existed. I’ve only ever wanted a woman to love me. I’ve only wanted to find a woman I could give ‘love’ to – someone to care for and look after.

  “Come on, please come and see me. Let me fix things for us. Let me try at least. Please just come in here and cuddle me, show me that everything is going to be okay between us.”

  Stand your ground. Keep control. I can’t stand my ground. I need to go in. Everything she wants, I want. I flick the monitor off and leave the room, locking it behind me. I put the keys in my pocket as I opened the door to the spare bedroom.

  She sees me, “I’m sorry.”

  I can’t go in. I want to go in but I’m ashamed. I can see her ankle from here and I can clearly see that I’ve made a mess of it. Apologise to her.

  No. I have nothing to apologise for. She did this. If you love her, you’d apologise to her anyway. She has apologised to you. You should apologise back.

  “Please believe me, I’m sorry.” Is she sorry because of the pain she’s in? Is she sorry because of the pain I’m in? I don’t know what to think anymore. “Aren’t you coming in?” she asks. I want to. “Please come in. Hold me. Let me out so we can cuddle. Please.”

  She’s begging.

  I am in control.

  I cautiously walk into the room and up to the bed. She tries to sit up to greet me but is stopped by the cuffs. I look down to her ankle and it’s swollen to nearly double the size of the other one.

  “Hi,” she says to me with a sheepish look in her eyes.

  “Hi.”

  I didn’t know what else to say, “How’s your ankle.”

  “I’d rather know how we are.” A clever answer if it’s a lie – it’ll make me believe she wants

  us to work more than how much pain her ankle is causing her which, by the looks of the swelling, should be significant.

  “So,” she continues, “how are we?” Answer her.

  “I’d always love you,” my voice is quiet now, quieter than it has been for a good few days now. I’m sure she can sense my personal shame.

  “Please hold me.”

  I put my hand on her leg and give it a squeeze. An embarrassed smile twitches over my mouth and my little sign of affection starts her off crying again.

  “I’m so sorry,” she says again as she pulls her wrists, struggling against her cuffs, “I want to hold you.”

  Later. I’m not ready yet.

  I stand up, “I’m going to start to get tea ready, is there anything special you want?”

  “Whatever you want to make for me, will be great.” I think for a while. It would be a shame to waste her mother.

  Nothing’s Changed

  I can barely think straight. The pain from my ankle is unbearable. I need to push it to the back of my mind and fix his trust in me. I need him to believe that I do still love him. I need him to allow me out of the cuffs again. Hopefully he will trust me again soon and allow me my confined freedom – he’s made it so I can’t run anywhere. As soon as my ankle heals, if it heals, I’ll try again. I’ll keep trying.

  He’s going to have to kill me.

  As I lay here, keeping my mind busy and trying to ignore the pain from my eye and ankle I realise that I’m going to need to get the keys to the locked rooms. With the keys, I’ll be able to open the front door and get out.

  When my ankle heals I’ll be able to run.

  The keys. Get the keys. There’s a thought easier said than done. He keeps the keys on him at all times, either in his pocket or, from what I’ve seen, on a chain around his neck. It’s not going to be easy. It will be less easy now he’ll be even more suspicious of me.

  Fuck.

  I can’t think of a way to get the keys. My ankle hurts too much. It might help if I could at least caress it; massage some of the pain away. Surely cuffing me to the bed was a bit much? Where does he think I am going to hobble? He’s taken control back.

  Temporarily.

  Come on, think Vanessa, think. How can you get the keys? Fuck the keys, how can you get out of the cuffs? All the time I’m stuck on the bed, all thoughts of escape are redundant. Forget the keys for a moment. How can I get out of these restraints?

  I’m deep in thought when the door swings open, revealing Peter.

  “Dinner won’t be long.” “Okay.”

  He doesn’t say anything else. He just continues to stand there, looking at me – a look on the face telling me that he wants to say something else. Perhaps I should try and start a conversation.

  “Am I going to eat it up here?” I ask, hoping that he’ll allow me out of the restraints.

  “Did you want to?”

  “I want to be with you,” I know he’s angry but I also know that he’ll want to be
with me. His love for me is nothing but his downfall, “I want to be with you for dinner, and for ever. If that means it just has to be the two of us, I can accept that. Just as long as I have you.”

  He pulls a key ring, crammed with different sized keys, from his pocket. The keys are kept in his pocket. Forget about the keys. Get out of the restraints and then worry about them.

  “You won’t try and run?” he asks. Of course I will – just as soon as my ankle permits it.