“Anaesthetic,” Driver barked.
“What do you want from me?” I croaked. My voice was so weak I barely recognized it. My eyes were closed again but the sound of shuffling close to my head make me snap them open wide. Driver towered over me, blocking the light from my face. I couldn't see his features clearly. I didn't want to anyway.
“We’re not going to hurt you. No one’s going to hurt you. I promise.” His voice was strong and resolute as if he truly meant what he said.
I wanted to laugh at him and spit in his face. Instead I just turned my head away from him in fear and shame.
“You got it?”
I frowned, thinking he was speaking to me.
“Yes. This will be more than enough,” the woman replied.
My heart punched against my ribcage. Knowing through the haze of my drug-induced brain what she planned to do, I tried to move my left arm -the nearest to her- but I could barely lift it. A warm, tiny hand gripped it firmly. I cried out before the prick of the needle pierced the skin. I felt the fluid being injected into the groove of my elbow. I panicked, unable to escape the merciless hold of sleep. My eyes released tears that trickle down my hairline and into the groove of my ears.
That was the last thing I felt before the room disappeared and I swam into darkness.
Jaz massaged her throbbing temples as questions bounced against the walls of her brain.
They drugged me. Twice. Bastards. And they gave me a vaginal exam? Why? What kind of sick twisted people do that? My own aunt betrayed me? Is she even my real aunt? I don’t know what to believe anymore.
She lay down sideways, wrapped the thick blanket around her and shivered inside it though she was boiling hot to the touch. The tears flowed easily and soaked the sheets by her face. She cried herself to sleep.
~Chapter 9 - Refuse~
Monday May 9th, 12:40 p.m.
Locked cell
The smell of food woke her. She forced her sore eyelids to open. The skin of her right cheek was glued to the sheet by dried salty tears. She peeled herself from it and sat up. Her brain flopped about in her skull making her feel nauseated.
The aroma of charcoaled red meat and potatoes filled her nostrils. She looked towards the door and then slowly trailed her puffy eyes downwards. A plastic brown tray had been placed on the floor. It wasn't long since it had been put there; the food was still steaming hot.
She took a whiff of it and her stomach gurgled and groaned.
There was also a plastic cup of water next to the matching cheap, plastic, blue plate. The only two things that stopped her from pouncing on the heavenly smelling food were fear and paranoia. They’ve drugged you before, she warned.
She had shuffled on her elbows and knees to the edge of the bed, now she leaned over, examining the plate of food as if a poisonous snake would suddenly spring out of it and bite her.
I’m so thirsty, she moaned in her head. She looked sceptically at the plastic cup. Drugs would probably be in there too.
She swung her legs round until they hung over the edge of the bed and rested the balls of her socked feet on the cold, light-brown floor. She started unconsciously tapping her right foot at least three times a second. She did that when she was nervous, troubled or in deep thought, but then stopped when her toes began to throb. She anchored her hands to the edge of the bed and fixed her eyes on the food, unblinking.
I need to eat, she persevered. My iron levels are already too low.
You can’t seriously be considering eating that drug-riddled crap? her fiercer mental voice argued.
I don’t really have a choice, do I?
Sure you do-
-And besides…it might not even be drugged.
The fierce voice gave an unconvinced ‘hymph!’ in reply before the reasoning voice asked, Okay then. What do you suppose I do?
You refuse to eat. Jaz’s mouth opened as she contemplated this worrying option. Then she frowned. This isn’t a game; you know how dangerous that is.
Would you prefer it if you spent the rest of your life alive, in here, being drugged and prodded and who knows what else? She didn’t like that idea one bit. Her whole group of emotional inward voices said in unison, I need my pills. I feel really ill.
Tell them then! the fierce voice bellowed.
Jaz cringed imagining that scenario. Ha! Tell my merciless kidnappers that my one major weakness- besides being locked up and given only the possibly drug-infested food they provide as my only sustenance- is that I happen to be severely anaemic? Oh yeah, and um, you have my pills. Could you please give them back? The reasoning voice laughed without humour.
Ah…
Yeah…ah.