After about an hour, my knees begin to ache. I roll back onto my side. I tell myself that Leroy isn’t a murderer. Just a rapist. Maybe he won’t kill me. I spend the hours wriggling my wrists back and forth trying to loosen the rope. I was going to be one of those girls who just disappears, no one to even notice I’m gone. Just a smudge on the map of existence. You’d have to lean in real close to even notice I was there.
I float in and out of consciousness. Once I hear the basement door open and the creak of a stair, I bolt upright, forgetting I’m tied to myself, and pull a muscle in my back painfully. I wait, tense, then I hear the door close and Leroy’s footsteps across the kitchen floor.
“Why don’t you just do something, you fuck!” I yell at the ceiling. I am tired of waiting. I want it over … whatever he’s planning. I can dish it; I can take it. I fall asleep, my left breast in a puddle, my throat burning, realization as thick as mud. I am going to die.
When I wake up, I am being dragged across a floor. My head aches, and my skin feels like it’s on fire. My wrists and legs are no longer tied together, and I’m able to flail about as my shoulder hits the bottom stair. He has me by the hair. I imagine he’s pulling out chunks, and I picture myself yanking away from his grasp, leaving him with handfuls of it. I realize, at once, that I am very sick. So sick I’m finding it difficult to fight, and each time my head or shoulder slams into one of the concrete stairs, I find it harder and harder to open my eyes. The light in the kitchen is bright. I catch a glimpse out the window and see that it is night. I smell bleach and cooked meat, and I want to vomit, except there’s nothing in my stomach. I am a rag doll, popped and propped at his kitchen table. He reties me as I gaze at him through half-open lids; hands behind my back, he leaves my ankles loose. I need to piss. I tell him so.
When he doesn’t respond, I say, “I can do it right here, but then you’re going to have to clean it up.” This seems to change his mind. He hauls me up by the scruff of my neck and shoves me toward the bathroom. I notice the bandages on his arms and wonder how bad the burns are. I want my pink lighter—a thing of security to me. He frees my wrists and ankles and stands in the doorway with his arms crossed.
God, I think. I should have just killed him when I had the chance. He watches me pull my pants down, his eyes on my crotch as I lower myself to the seat. I keep my hands on the top of my pants and lean forward to skew his view. My thumb grazes the band-aid on my thigh. I work at lifting it, swiping my thumbnail back and forth until a piece of the corner raises.
“What are you going to do to me?” I ask. He looks at me with hard hatred, and my toes curl in my boots. It’s in that moment that I want my mother. I jar at the thought. How strange that, in this moment, taken and tied in a serial rapist’s kitchen, I want the woman who abandoned me. I sniff and look out the window. Leroy looks as if he’s deciding whether or not he wants to say something.
“Well?” I say.
He moves quickly, retying the ropes around my wrists and grabbing my arm. He half picks me up as he drags me back toward the basement. I struggle against him. I don’t want to go back down there into the cold, but, with my hands tied, I have little to use against his bulk. I don’t fall this time. Leroy failed to retie my ankles, and I’m able to catch myself as he throws me down the stairs. I twist my ankle before I can grab onto the railing.
Hours later, shivering in what I’ve discovered is the warmest corner of the basement, Leroy brings me food. A sandwich, water, and a few potato chips on a styrofoam plate. I wait until he’s back up the stairs before I lift the water to my lips. It’s a good sign that he’s bringing me food. Surely you don’t feed the person you are planning to kill. He is thinking, deciding what to do with me.
I stick my tongue in the water to taste it … no bitterness. I am so thirsty, I chug the glass and am out of breath by the time I set it down. I sniff the sandwich, run my fingernail across the bread. There is no butter—only a slice of bologna. I eat it. That is my first mistake—eating his food. Trusting. Leroy is smart that way. He blends in, wears you down. It is in a sandwich that he hid the pills. I should have known when I tasted butter on the bread.
WHEN I WAKE UP, I am in a white, white room. My arms are restrained. I lift my head to get a look around. There is an IV snaking into my arm, machines gently beeping. My mouth is dry, my throat swollen. A hospital. A hospital. I look for a call button, but can’t reach it with my wrists in the restraints.
“Hello?”
The minute I speak, a pain shoots through my head. I flinch back onto the pillow and try again.
“Hello?”
There is the sound of footsteps in the hall. Flat, boring shoes. A nurse is coming. I let my head fall back and stare up at the ceiling. Leroy. His basement. Was it the sandwich or the water? Stupid mistake. The door opens, and a young nurse walks in. She looks unsure of herself. New.
“Where am I?” I croak. She looks over her shoulder before closing the door behind her and walking over to my chart.
“The Evergreen University Hospital,” she says in a clipped voice.
“How did I get here?”
She won’t look at me. “You should talk to the doctor. He’ll be in soon.” She walks around the room, humming, and I wish that my arms were free so I could strangle her.
“You have to tell me what’s wrong with me at least! Why am I here?”
She walks to the window and closes the blinds. The room is suddenly in twilight.
“You overdosed,” she says. “Then slit your wrists.”
“Where?” I ask.
She pauses. “In the hospital parking lot.” I feel a flicker of admiration. Leroy is a lot smarter than I gave him credit for.
“Why are you restraining me?”
“The doctor will be in shortly,” she says.