by Tara Brown
Eventually, I slept uncomfortably.
I woke to the sound of what could only be described as the end of the world.
A loud noise rattled inside the cell, shaking my brain with the echo off the steel walls.
One side of the box vibrated.
Was I found?
Were the vibrations my friends?
Was this something worse?
Did I dare make a noise?
Light danced in the dark as something cut away the metal wall opposite me. It made lines of brightness and shadows. My stinky toilet rattled against the cold floor.
With my back against the far wall and my knees pulled in as hard as they would go against my chest, I waited to see if the sawing or welding would free me or make this all worse.
There had been worse.
Before the cell.
I shuddered remembering that.
The sound stopped when a rectangle of light was made in the hard metal.
Two bangs filled the air. I barely heard them through my muffled ears.
I didn’t need to see it to know a metal doorway had been cut and, as if done by magic, it fell away.
Light blinded me. Even with my eyes closed it hurt, stinging through the lids. Not sure if it was a dream or real, I waited to look. I couldn’t see anyway. My eyes still hadn’t adjusted.
I didn’t need to see though. I needed to hear.
There was nothing.
No one moved.
The person on the outside who had cut me free didn’t make a sound. Were they staring at me? Were they thinking about coming into the hole?
Was this going to get worse?
The clean scent of the air rushing in made me realize how bad I smelled, how bad the stale air in the cell was.
As my lids lifted and the light filtered through my lashes I fought with the brightness. It took moments of me blinking and adjusting. Finally, I was able to see but what I saw scared me.
Like a flower, I’d wilted in the dark.
My fingers came into focus first, skinny and boney. My wrists were tiny and covered in old blood and new swelling. The small amounts of food that were slid into the cell had never been enough to satisfy me. I’d been hungry for however long I’d been here. My stomach had shrunk and my body had slowly withered with it.
My vision cleared, revealing a light—no, a window. The floor before me was littered with debris I hadn’t realized was there. Bits of toilet paper and food and filth. Bits of me maybe too.
My knees didn’t hurt when I moved toward the light. They were used to crawling and scraping along the cold floor. The blood stains proved that.
Nothing made sense.
I knew it was a trap, and yet I went to it, drawn.
I understood how moths felt. They couldn't stop themselves.
If I was half as smart as I pretended to be, I would have stayed in the box and acknowledged the opening as the trap it was.
And while I did acknowledge what it was, I kept going.
The jagged ends of the hole cut in the metal cage—no, box—scraped my fingers as I gripped the warm edges and peered out.
My heart raced.
My mouth dried of any saliva, which hadn’t been a lot to begin with.
But I forced myself to face my death.
Anything was better than staying in the cage.
I scanned the large bright hallway but I saw nothing.
In both directions the hallway went on forever.
I couldn’t see the end but my eyes weren’t exactly clear and focused.
I could see there wasn’t another person in the hall with me, just ragged old curtains billowing in the windows. Nor were there any of the tools used to cut me from the hole. It was truly baffling but I didn’t care.
It was like an act of God, only not.
I blinked and looked to both sides of the hallway; they mirrored each other.
Both were long and wide, with wallpaper and paint peeling from the walls and ceiling. The tall, thin windows were boxes of light and the sheer white drapes resembled ghosts.
The floor was broken pieces of old tiles with boards showing underneath.
Swallowing hard in my parched throat, I climbed from the box, shaking from the cold or the shock or everything. Cool wind made my skin shiver under my thin tank top and underwear.
When I was fully out of the box, I stayed on my knees but looked back at it, wondering if I was safer in there. The sound of the scratching feet was gone. I didn’t know what that meant.
The steel box sat pressed against a wall but it appeared smaller than it was. Some of the box was in the white wall as if the building had been built around it.
There was a thick bead of black rubber or something all around the floor and edges of the box—the reason there had been no light inside at all. The food door was in the wall somewhere.
The door that had been cut out sat on the floor to the right of the box, placed with one side pointing to the halls like an arrow. Being a rectangle it made a perfect arrow in either direction.
I glanced both ways, wondering what I should do.
Neither side of the hall was inviting. Both seemed run-down and deserted.
It was the worst kind of hallucination or oasis.
Instead of going to the right or left, I turned and looked at the window. The sea was frothing on the beach, hitting the rocks with force. I was north of Crimson Cove. I had to be. The beach north of us was like this, rocky and rugged.
Just seeing the stark day, I got colder. The wind coming in the open windows was just a taste of how frigid the air was outside.
Pushing on my knee to get up, I stood on shaky legs, noticing the crick in my back. When I stood all the way up, it cracked several times and ached.
Everything hurt from being cramped up in the small box and not really moving, except crawling around.
Running didn’t feel like an option but it was the only one.
Taking a long inhale of the crisp air and exhaling a frosty breath, I wondered how far I would make it in underwear and a tank top with no shoes.
If I were Lainey, I would know how long it took a person to get exposure and how much time I had to get away.
If I were Lindsey, I would know how to find a way out, sneaking and not getting caught.
If I were Sage, I would cunningly become friends with my attacker, winning them over with fake smiles and charm.
But being me, I had limited options. I was the loud-mouthed slut everyone hated or loved with no in-between.
It was in that moment, standing there in a strange hallway next to a small prison, freezing and nearly naked, that I realized I was done being a prisoner. I needed to fight back. I wasn’t as smart as Lain, and I wasn’t as clever as Linds, and I couldn’t be as nice as Sage. I couldn’t smile at a person who made me shit and sleep in the same place for however long I’d been there.
I had to find a way to be strong.
The window in front of me was closed in with rusted silver bars. I wouldn’t be leaving through that. But the billowy curtains went in either direction, meaning other windows were open too, no matter which way I went. I turned left, the way that felt wrong. The direction I wouldn’t have chosen naturally.
My feet cramped the first few steps, and I noticed a remarkable change in strength. My leg muscles were weak and tired.
The sheer curtains flickered in the hallway, casting shadows and tricking me into thinking there was more to the hall than there was.
No noises except the wind and the beach.
No people.
No cameras, I could see.
What was this place?
At the first window with a long silky drape, I paused, sighing when I saw the thick metal bars on it too.
I was a rat in a maze being forced to walk in the direction that bitch wanted me to. But I knew this maze didn’t have cheese at the end. Just something painful to make this all go away.
It was a game. It was all a game.
One way, I would be el
ectrocuted or stabbed, and the other way, drowned or shot.
I was choosing my fate, my death.
I could have stayed back at the box, waited and starved or been driven mad.
But this was faster.
I was already starving.
I was already scared.
There was no doubt I was already crazy.
However long I’d been in that box, it was too long.
My hair from one leg brushed against the other, making me twitch. Like the scabs, it suggested I’d been here over a week.
My gel nails had grown out, the ones that weren’t broken off. I’d missed my appointment by at least a week.
I didn’t even dare imagine what my lashes looked like. I’d missed my fill for sure.
I couldn’t do another week here, not like this.
I needed to go home or die.
This was the end.
Taking small uncertain steps was hard, not just from the cold wind dancing with the creepy curtains, sending them slithering against me. It was also hard because I was terrified. The kind where parts of you were numb and others throbbed for no reason.
I gagged, but with nothing in my stomach, nothing came up.
When I reached the end of the impossibly long hallway, I turned the corner left, walking away from the beach and the barred windows.
Up the small hallway was a door. Nothing fancy or scary, just a door. It was slightly ajar. I reached for the handle, pausing to see the swollen scabs on my wrists. Cuts she’d done to me when I woke the first day, tied to the table in the dirty, cold steel room.
Remembering it too clearly, I turned my hand over, wincing at the cigarette burns. She hadn’t even smoked them, just lit them and put them out on my hands in the shape of a heart. My eyes roamed my body, discovering more scabs. She’d cut me on my stomach and wrists. The burn marks were on my legs and hands.
She had laughed as I screamed and begged her to stop.
Her steely blue eyes were filled with hate. But the smug grin on her face was the worst. She had loved every scream. Every second of agony.
She hated me, far more than I hated her. Even as she sliced my wrist and sewed it shut, she had hated me more.
The white bandages she had put on and then pulled off a day later had ripped out some of the stitches. I’d cried real tears for the first time then. She had laughed and wiped my tears away.
She had offered me a drink, running her fingers through my hair and telling me I was a good girl.
Her face became hazy from the drink and then everything went dark.
I woke in the box.
I wanted to hate her more than she hated me but I still didn't. I still wouldn't have stuck her in the box and read her diary. I wouldn't do something like that to anyone, not even her. I thought I was hard before I met her.
Taking a breath and preparing myself for whatever she had next, I pushed the door open and stepped in.
Chapter Three
The Babadook
The hallway in front of me mirrored the one I was in, minus the billowy curtains and barred windows. It was just a hall with fluorescent lights and a single door at the end.
I walked slowly, scowling in confusion at the posters that lined the walls, encouraging people to keep on going. They were happy pictures of women hugging each other and a nurse smiling with a clipboard.
My feet, aching already from the effort of walking, pushed on, taking each step carefully. I didn't fear the moment the way I should; I didn't grasp the amount of fear I should have had. I was numb, mostly.
When I reached the end of the hall my mind was a whirling storm of possibilities.
Hope didn't cross my mind.
I didn't imagine I would enter the last door and be free.
I knew I would have to fight to the death for my freedom.
I just never expected to find what I did.
The cold knob turned with almost no effort, popping the door open and revealing a smell I didn't expect. It took me to my knees.
My mouth watered to the point a small bit of drool slid down my chin. A tearless sob escaped my chapped lips.
Fresh bacon and coffee and something else—something clean or sterile—hit me like a wall. I leaned in, smelling it and savoring the scent. Normally, meat wasn’t a big one for me but there was nothing like the smell of bacon and coffee, especially when you were hungry, and I was starved.
The room was as bright as the hall but it was wide and open. No one was there.
“Got her!” a lady shouted, coming out of nowhere.
I flinched seeing her and panicked.
I tried to turn and get up but my legs were weak.
My fingers dug into the floor, trying to drag myself from the woman who was on me, grabbing me by the arm and pulling me to her. “Are you all right? Can you tell us where you were? What did you take?” Her words got lost in my terror-stricken brain as the numbness fell away and a scream ripped through the air.
My muscles, every one of them, tensed all at once.
Everything came and went in flashes.
White shirts and black pants and a man hugging me, with the woman still asking me where I was and what I had taken. It was chaos and I was lost in it. The man turned, shouting at the other people in the room to get the doctor.
The word didn’t make me feel better. It didn’t enter my mind that I might be safe or rescued. I didn’t have that capability.
Still terrified, I fought with everything I had. Apparently, that wasn't much.
In a matter of chaotic moments, I was facedown on the floor, watching feet walking and running as voices shouted and panicked with me.
My body shook as they pressed me down, telling me to be still and not fight it. Telling me I was safe.
It was a lie.
I knew that. My face being pressed into the filthy floor told me that.
My dry eyes burned, begging for a tear to join the ragged sobs rupturing from me.
Something stabbed into my leg.
It made everything warmer than it was.
It made me into jelly.
They lifted me, carrying me under the fluorescent lights.
I was going back to the cell.
I would never get away from that cell.
She wanted me to smell the bacon and the food.
She wanted me to almost hope.
And I had.
Foolishly, I had hoped. I told myself I hadn’t, but I had. I had lied to myself and I’d believed it.
She hated me far more than I could ever hate her.
I just didn't know why.
It was the last thought I had as everything went dark.
When I woke my head throbbed. The pain made me wince as I cracked a dry eye open. Light blinded me. For a moment I missed the cell. I missed the certainty of it.
This place was new and I didn't trust it.
I didn't trust anything.
The room was pale and small with a couple of doors and machines all around me. One was an IV machine. The tube went into my right hand, no doubt poisoning me.
I tried to lift my arms but they were tied to the metal rails of the bed.
Bed?
I wasn’t back in the room where she burned and cut and tortured me. The smell was different, along with the paint and the light. I was somewhere completely different. It was clean and nice.
But it didn’t mean I was safe.
I took a deep breath and waited for the numbness to take over.
But it didn't.
Rage and fury burned inside me. When I closed my eyes, squeezing them shut, tears popped from them. It soothed and burned at the same time, a soothing burn. I took a moment to just feel sorry for myself before I had to figure a way out.
“Sierra?”
I opened one blurry eye to find a nurse-type lady in my doorway. She smiled nicely. I didn't know what trap this was. Was she the one who was going to burn me? She wasn't the little blue-eyed girl. She was older and looked like a real nurse.<
br />
“Honey, you had everyone so worried.” Her eyes flickered to the new white bandages that wrapped around my wrists. “Your cuts are infected. You were a day away from becoming septic, maybe hours. I wish you could understand how serious that is. And how lucky you are to be alive.” She frowned, not like she was judging me but like she pitied me.
My eyes darted back to the bandages. “The girl—” My throat crackled my words. I swallowed and tried again, sounding worse, “The girl who cut me, where is she? Where am I? Why haven’t the police been called? Do you have any idea who I am, who my father is?”
The pity left her face as a smug look of doubt took over. “I know exactly who your father is. He’s the poor man who’s been searching like mad, trying to find you, racked with guilt that this was all somehow his fault.” She scoffed and shook her head, leaving me in the room.
I got the distinct impression, in some way I was to blame. Or rather, she believed I was.
Not that it mattered at this moment. More importantly, I needed to get clean and talking with the lady was obviously not going to work, even if I was the victim here. The heart-shaped burns and cuts were covered, but the general filth and disgusting way I looked and smelled lingered. “Wait!” I called after her, sounding like a zombie and matching my appearance.
“What?” She popped her head back in, lifting her dark eyebrows.
“Can I have a shower, please?” I forced the please.
“You do stink to high heaven.” She paused, contemplating. “You promise to be a good girl? No fighting or acting up?”
“Of course,” I said indignantly. I didn't mean to but the question was insane. Why would I fight her on something I had asked for?
“All right. I’ll get the kit.” She turned and left me, tied to the bed, stinking of my own shit and piss and whatever else I’d accidently gotten on myself in that cell.
She came back moments later with a towel, shampoo, conditioner, and a large bar of soap. They looked like they belonged in a cheap hotel, but in this moment they might as well have been imported from France and handcrafted by angels. “If this goes well, I can see about getting you some lunch. I bet you’re hungry. I can’t imagine what you were eating all that time you were tunneling.”
“What?” The word didn’t match anything in my head. Tunneling? What did it mean? It was an unfamiliar word suddenly, even though I knew the definition. I couldn't wrap my head around it.
