“I look forward to it,” Kassian says, eyeing me, the smile lingering on his lips. “Until then...”
He pulls the phone away from his ear without finishing his thought, ending the call before pressing another button, the light disappearing, leaving us in total darkness. I blink, trying to adjust my eyes so I can make him out, but there’s no natural light down here in the basement.
“Come here,” Kassian says, his voice so quiet that it’s like the shadows are whispering, beckoning me closer.
I don’t move, though.
I want nothing that lives in these shadows.
Kassian gives it maybe ten seconds before the chain jingles. He grabs it, yanking on it like it’s a leash. I try to resist, losing my breath, digging my heels in, but he’s too damn strong. I cry out as I’m dragged along the floor, the concrete skinning my knees and the palms of my hands when I try to catch myself to keep from smacking into it.
As soon as I’m within reach, he grabs where it’s wrapped around my neck and pulls my face right up to his face. I can hardly make him out, even this close, but I can feel his warm breath against my skin.
“I said come here,” he says, his voice still quiet, a forced kind of calm. “Have you gone deaf? Do we need to clean out your ears?”
I don’t answer him.
He doesn’t care about my answer.
Closing my eyes, I hold my breath as he runs his nose along my jawline, the scruff on his face rubbing against my cheek. I’m trembling. I know he can feel it, and I try to stop, but his proximity makes it hard for me to get a grip.
He makes me feel like that teenager again.
“You are still beautiful when you sleep, suka,” he says. “I could not bring myself to wake you. You looked so at peace. You do not look that way when your eyes are open. Why is that?”
“You know why,” I whisper.
He pulls back some, looking me in the eyes, the tip of his nose brushing against the tip of mine. He tilts his head ever-so-slightly, and I let out a shaky breath, knowing he’s thinking about kissing me.
The thought makes me grimace.
“I came down here so we could catch up on your lessons, pretty girl,” he says, just a whisper away from my mouth, “but it seems as if we will have to put that on hold for now.”
He lets go of the chain, and I immediately move away, scrambling to put a bit of space between us. Just a foot or two, just enough so I can’t smell his cologne, so his cruel warmth can’t swaddle me in the cold, damp room.
Standing up, he starts walking away, like he’s just going to leave, like he’s going to go without torturing me for the moment. My stomach twists in knots, heavier than the thick metal constricting my throat. Here I am, after fighting so hard for so long, once more at the mercy of a man who isn’t particularly merciful.
I don’t trust his passive demeanor.
He’s up to something. I know it.
“Oh, I almost forgot,” he says, stalling. “I have something for you.”
Of course.
Closing my eyes, I sigh, hearing his steady footsteps as he approaches again. Whatever he’s got, I don’t want it. He can keep it. He can shove it up his ass, for all I care. The only thing I want is to see my daughter, so unless he’s giving me that...
Be gone.
Kassian stalls in front of me, and I peek through the darkness as he reaches into the front pocket of his black slacks, pulling something out. A piece of paper, it looks like, crumbled and folded again and again, into a little square.
“I have been carrying this around for some time,” he says, unfolding it. “I told my kitten that I would give this to you, a gift from her, whenever I saw you again.”
He drops the paper, and it floats to the concrete in front of me. I don’t reach for it right away, just staring at where the paper lands, unable to make out any of it in the darkness. My heart races, like the paper is a ticking time bomb, like it has the power to detonate everything inside of me that I’ve somehow kept together even after Kassian tried to break me apart.
“It will not bite,” he says, his hand on my head, petting my hair before I even realize he’s reaching for me. I instinctively recoil, expecting punishment for the snub—a blow to the face, a thump to the cheek, maybe a hand fisting my hair—but he merely pulls away, turning to leave. “I will let that go this time. Be a good girl this afternoon, and I will have a mattress brought down.”
I shake my head, although I know he can’t see it, whispering, “I don’t want it.”
There used to be a bed down here. There used to be a lot. The first time I found myself locked in here, all those years ago, it looked like a shabby studio apartment, dirty and dark, but yet, it had been livable. You see, since Kassian spent so much time down here, he wanted to be comfortable, but I changed that, because the only thing he cherished more than his own comfort was my suffering. He’d gladly do without if it meant I had nothing.
It went from a regular little jail cell to solitary confinement.
Slowly, piece-by-piece, it all went away. The blankets, the extra clothes, the towels, the sheets. He ripped out the plumbing after I flooded his basement, leaving just a toilet that only flushes when water is poured into it. The bath was removed after I threatened to drown myself, replaced with a hose that is now kept under lock-and-key after I blasted him with cold water when he tried to come near me.
The bed, though, was last to go. He clung to that convenience like a dying man to his last breath, but after I stabbed him with a rusty piece of metal I tore from the box-spring, he finally got rid of it.
That’s when the chains appeared.
Act like an animal and I will treat you like one.
I guess getting that tetanus shot was Kassian’s final straw, because after that, it wasn’t a simple game of willpower anymore.
After that, he became cruel.
Not like locking girls in basements was nice in the first place, but a line was drawn that day. I drew blood. He decided it was time he did the same.
Before then, it was mostly mental. He didn’t want to ruin the goods, so he left no permanent traces of himself. That changed with me, though, and sometimes I wonder if I brought that on myself. Would it have been easier to escape him had I not fought so hard?
“You will change your mind,” he says. “The first time I slam your face into the floor, you will be begging me for that mattress, because it will muffle your cries a lot better than the concrete.”
I bite my lip to keep from reacting to that.
As he starts up the stairs to leave, I reach over, carefully running my fingertips along the paper, feeling the waxy substance coating it. Crayon. She drew me a picture. I smile to myself at that thought, but it quickly fades, worried about what she might’ve drawn, if maybe it was monsters.
“I will turn on a light,” Kassian calls back to me, “so you may see your present.”
A bright light flicks on, harsh and blinding, hurting my eyes. I squint, trying to ward it off, and look at the paper as I pick it up.